New NYC Promotion Policy Rattles Some ELL Educators

By Ines Alicea, ELL Outlook™ Contributing Writer

When Carmen Perez Hogan arrived in New York from her native Puerto Rico, she looked forward to entering the third grade with other students her age. But, said Perez Hogan, now coordinator of the Office of Bilingual Education for the New York State Education Department, educators had other plans for her because she spoke limited English. "My [English as a Second Language instruction] was going through the second grade again," she said. "You go through the rest of your school years being older than your classmates. I wish I hadn't lost a year. I hope we've come a long way since then."         

Perez Hogan knows exactly the frustration English language learners (ELLs) must be feeling as some of them ponder that same fate under a new policy in New York City schools. The policy calls for retaining third-grade students who fail to reach a certain score on standardized mathematics and language arts tests.

Frustrated that New York state has the nation's highest drop-out rate, Chancellor Joel Klein of the New York City Department of Education and New York City Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg joined forces to develop citywide reforms to reduce the drop-out rate. What evolved was a series of policies entitled Children First that focused on early intervention and stopped the promotion of students to the next grade who hadn't mastered basic skills. "We are convinced that we have a far better chance of helping our struggling students while they are still young, rather than waiting and trying desperately to play catch-up when they get into the higher grades," Klein told the New York City Council's Education Committee recently. "The tragedy here is that the odds these students will catch up are very, very low."

A key element of Klein's policies was to focus on the third grade, which Klein said "is a critical transition point in a student's education," where the student moves from learning to read to reading to learn in the fourth grade. Klein argues that students who have not mastered reading by third grade are unlikely ever to be able to read at the same level as their peers. He cites statistics showing that in 1999 and in 2000 about 25,000 of the city's third-graders performed at Level 1 (the lowest level) on one or both of the citywide tests, and that by 2003 82 percent of the 1999 cohort and 74 percent of the 2000 cohort were still performing at Level 1 on one or both tests. "We are determined to break this pattern of failure," Klein said in a prepared statement about the new policy. "And we are committed to helping as many students as possible fulfill their potential to learn. Addressing the problems of social promotion head-on is a crucial step toward fulfilling this commitment to our students."        

So Klein required that third-graders score a Level 2 or higher on both the English language arts and mathematics citywide standardized tests in order to be promoted to fourth grade. "We're confident that we are on the right path and, while change of this magnitude is no doubt difficult, we must be prepared to go through the changes for the benefit of our kids," Klein said.

Critics say the policy will unduly harm ELLs, who are expected to score as well as native English speakers. "High-stake tests and misguided retention policies shift the blame of educational failure on students rather than on a system in which unequal funding and resources have inadequately prepared them," said Luis Reyes in testimony on March 3 before the New York City Council's Education Committee. Reyes is an assistant professor at Hunter College and co-coordinator of the New York-based Coalition for Educational Equity for English Language Learners.        

The problem is that third-grade ELLs who have been enrolled in New York City schools since kindergarten must score a Level 2 on the tests, the same as native speakers, in order to move to the fourth grade. Much of their ELL education, however, is focused on English as a second language, not the English language arts focus that native speakers have received.

If the students have been in the country three years or fewer, an ESL test can be given in lieu of the English language arts test. The state uses the New York State English as a Second Language Achievement Test (NYSESLAT) to measure English proficiency and, consistent with federal requirements under the No Child Left Behind Act, sets standards for annual yearly progress. Consequently, an ELL may meet state standards for improvement in English proficiency based on the NYSESLAT and still remain an ELL for four to six years. "A student could improve on their NYSESLAT test but fail on the English language arts test and be held back if they don't get a Level 2," Mark Lewis, the Albany representative for the New York Immigration Coalition, said of the city policy.        

The city's promotion policy applies to ELLs in all grades, but Lewis said there seems to be more discretion in other grades than there is in the third grade. Those third-grade ELLs who started in New York City schools after kindergarten, or who have been in this country three years or fewer, are exempt from taking the tests. But the majority of third-grade ELLs started in kindergarten, said Lewis. City officials argue that the third-grade ELLs who have been here longer than three years can apply for exemptions, but Lewis said language barriers often keep parents from seeking exemptions for their children.        

The math test, which has numerous word problems, not just numeric equations, is available in Spanish, Chinese, and Haitian Creole, and schools have been told they can provide oral translators during the tests to ELLs who speak other languages. Each school, however, must decide whether federal and state Title I and Title III funds should be spent for translators or for other activities, said Perez Hogan. Schools also argue that finding translators for the more than 140 languages represented in the schools can be challenging. "It would be outrageous to keep a third-grader from moving to the fourth grade if they don't get translators and they're not proficient in English," said Lewis. "The thing is that at some schools, the kids may have gotten help and at other schools, they didn't."        

There is another option besides retention for students who get a Level 1 on either or both tests. They can attend a summer program offered by the schools if their teacher, principal, and superintendent do not push for retention in June when the first test scores are released and agree on promotion to the fourth grade if they retake and pass the test in August. The teacher must initiate the process by submitting evidence of work at Level 2 or above and recommend the promotion to fourth grade. Critics say the appeals process is complicated because parents must get the teacher to agree to make an appeal to promote the student to the fourth grade and then the principal and local instructional superintendent must concur. "It will take until August for the child's fate to be determined, causing months of anxiety and uncertainty, but the process is clearly stacked against promotion," said Reyes.        

Reyes and Lewis say that numerous studies have shown that retaining a student has not proven successful. A 1999 study by the Intercultural Development Research Association entitled "Failing Our Children: Finding Alternatives to In-Grade Retention" [1] found that 50 percent of students who are retained do no better academically the second time they complete the grade they failed, and that Hispanic students are retained at twice the rate of white students.        

Moreover, Reyes and Lewis argue that retaining students can exacerbate an already high drop-out rate. A study entitled "The Class of 2003: Four-Year Longitudinal Report and 2002-2003 Event Dropout Rates" [2] showed that in New York City Hispanic students had the lowest graduation rate, with 43.4 percent graduating, compared to a nearly 54 percent graduation rate among other students, and that the Hispanic drop-out rate was the highest of all groups, at nearly 26 percent.

Perez Hogan and her office are closely watching developments. She said that state officials are receiving many inquiries about the policy and she feels the city needs to clarify its explanation for parents and educators "so there is nothing left to interpretation." Although city officials told her that their policies were closely aligned with state policies, Perez Hogan said that the state does not have a retention policy. "The bottom line is that it's not really clear," she said. "We are concerned. We want to make sure our kids are not left out just because they are [ELLs]. That is not an acceptable reason."              

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