By Andrew Fefer, Reporter/Editor
When you ask Gerardo Licon if he is a native Spanish-speaker, he will tell you “yes and no.”
Born in the United States, Licon grew up in Los Angeles, and was raised by immigrant parents who came to America from Mexico. He said he feels most comfortable speaking ‘Spanglish,’ using vocabulary and expressions from both languages.
“It was very easy in Los Angeles to have Spanish reinforced by a lot of different sources,” he said. “From, not just my parents at home, but my aunts and uncles, and honestly, most of my peers were in similar situations where they were of immigrant parents and so they too spoke English and Spanish.”
Licon is the father of a year-and-a-half-old daughter, who he hopes will have an experience similar to his, but in the Chippewa Valley. He said he is excited about the possibility of her joining a proposed dual immersion program in the Eau Claire Area School District. The proposal would have a class or classes with half native English-speaking students and half native Spanish-speakers. The teachers would then switch back and forth between Spanish and English while teaching the students.
The proposal includes two potential elementary sites: Longfellow Elementary School on Balcom Street and Locust Lane Elementary School on Locust Lane. They were chosen because they have the necessary classroom space and enrollments low enough that other students would not be displaced, according to Jim Schmitt, the district’s executive director of teaching & learning. He added that location and the school staff’s experience with English learners would be considered.
The proposal calls for a kindergarten class to be set up in the 2019-2020 school year, with a grade level added to it each year until 2024-2025, when the program would consist of classes for kindergarten students and those in grades 1-5.
“When we do it, we’re going to start small so we can do it right,” Schmitt said.
He said the district’s guidelines call for classes to include between 19 and 25 students and that the current goal for kindergarten classes is 22 students. He added that the district would work with the School Board to determine the size of dual immersion classes.
Application process and cost
Noting that every academic program comes at a cost, Schmitt said the goal is to run one classroom at one school at the kindergarten level and then have what he called a “lottery system” to let families apply to be part of it. A 17-member Dual Immersion Committee, formed last fall to provide feedback and make recommendations on the proposal, will work through the details of that lottery approach, he said.
Students would be bused from any elementary school in the district, which would account for much of the added cost, Schmitt said. He added that the district is trying to tap into the bus route for the Chippewa Valley Montessori Charter School, with immersion students dropped off where their program is housed.
When asked about ballpark cost figures to start and expand the program, Schmitt said the district is still working with the School Board to “share those costs and to finalize them.”
“We still have to run an elementary classroom, a kindergarten classroom, so that’s not a new cost to us,” Schmitt said. “We’re just re-allocating from one location to another. We still have to have aides and things like that.”
Schmitt noted, however, that the district would have to purchase materials that are unique to the class as well as provide staff training. He said that the district will be able to utilize grant money to help support the effort, but no specific figures are available now.
“If we were given permission to do this by our School Board, we’d have to work through some of those issues to make sure that we can develop a sustainable program, both academically and fiscally,” Schmitt said.
El Centro de Conexión de Chippewa Valley
The effort to start a dual immersion program in the district dates back about 18 months. That is when leaders from the district started conversations about it with El Centro de Conexión de Chippewa Valley.
That group of almost 250 volunteers is a non-profit organization in Eau Claire that was established in 2010 to start a conversation about the needs of the area’s growing Latino population. Most of these volunteers are from Eau Claire, but others are from surrounding areas.
For the last few years, the group has met at least once a year with the school district’s superintendent to discuss any concerns raised by the area’s Latino community.
Licon is the president of the organization’s board of directors, and said that the work the district is doing to create a dual immersion program is “fantastic.”
“A lot of communities only work on these kinds of things when they become a necessity, and I think this dual immersion program is more about being proactive than reactionary to issues,” he said.
“Some places will simply just get interpreters when necessary, or get some bilingual aides, or they may have a bilingual education transitional program when the children are young…or before they learn English fluently,” Licon added. “But, I think a lot of those programs under-serve that community and then sometimes even when they’re well served with those transitional programs, they end up stigmatizing these youth by separating them and just treating them differently.”
Licon said that this program benefits both native English-speakers and native Spanish-speakers while treating them the same, which he considered to be a way of bringing the students together as a community. That is also a significant part of El Centro’s mission.
An El Centro board member is on the Dual Immersion Committee, as is a Chippewa Valley Technical College faculty member who also sits on the El Centro board.
“The implementation of the way the idea is taking shape seems to be going well,” Licon said.
Administrator cites research
Schmitt said there is a lot of research that shows benefits for all students who enroll in the classes, regardless of their native language. The goal is for both groups of students to read, write, listen to and speak both English and Spanish proficiently.
“We know at those younger ages, kids have a great capacity to learn languages,” Schmitt said, adding that both groups of students will benefit.” That’s the beauty of it,” he added.
“Both groups grow immensely by being in that experience, because…the younger we can tap into students to learn those language skills, the gains are significant.”
The district’s Board is currently considering the proposal, and heard a presentation on it at its Feb. 5 meeting. The benefits listed in that presentation included academic achievement, a partnership with families and communities and collaborative cultures.
Schmitt also said that he thinks Eau Claire’s population has changed drastically during the past few years, and now includes an increasing number of Spanish-speakers, which helped to create a demand for this program.
Social, cultural benefits for native Spanish-speaking families
Licon said there is both excitement and interest in the dual immersion proposal among the area’s Latino community. He recently received an email from someone in the Twin Cities who is considering a move to Eau Claire, and that hearing about the dual immersion proposal helped to shape the perception of Eau Claire as a good place to live.
He has seen general interest from native English-speaking parents, but has heard more questions about the proposal from native Spanish-speaking parents who aren’t assuming that their children will be able to take part in the program.
“What tends to happen with Mexican-American children growing up in an area when there is not a large Latino population or Spanish-speaking population is that…they lose their Spanish, despite how much individual parents work at home to try to teach them their Spanish.”
Licon believes this will help children of native Spanish speakers salvage part of their culture, communicate with their relatives and not be “cultural outsiders” if they were to go to Latin America. He believes native English-speaking parents recognize the benefit of their children communicating with an increasing number of Spanish-speakers and how it could help their job prospects in the future. He said his daughter would receive that benefit as well, but it’s not what Licon considers most important for him and his family.
“I think it’s more social and cultural,” he said.
Next steps
Schmitt said that approval from the Board of Education is needed before any further steps are taken on the proposed program.
“Hopefully in April, a couple months after that last presentation, hopefully they’ll be ready to have a conversation about…if they want to pursue next steps in this process,” Schmitt added.
With school board approval, Schmitt said that professional and curriculum development would happen in the 2018-2019 school year.
The district is preparing metrics that can be studied once students begin in the program to determine if it is a success. Schmitt said there have also been conversations about expanding the program to include the Hmong language, but that its structure makes this a more challenging task..
“It’s just a little bit…different model for us to work through and it’s going to take us a little bit of time to get there.”