North Myrtle Beach instructor wins S.C. Adult Education ESL teacher of the year
Tammy Humphreys takes her students to the library like most teachers passionate about English do, but she also gives them coffee breaks, teaches them how to open checking accounts and understands if they have to skip class now and again.
Humphreys, who is one of nine English as a second language teachers in the Horry County Adult Education Department, won the first S.C. Adult Education ESL teacher of the year award at a state banquet Friday. She helped start the North Myrtle Beach ESL program last year, and she beat more than 80 other teachers statewide to win the honor.
Read full story - Myrtle Beach Online.
Center for Parent Leadership at the Prichard Committee: Seminar
March 3, 2009 by admin
Filed under ESL Classes
From: Molly Toney (mtoney@prichardcommittee.org)
Parent Leaders: An untapped resource in education
- Join your peers from around the country in a two-day seminar where you will learn how to develop and sustain a successful parent leadership program.
- Learn best practices for planning, staffing, developing curriculum, recruiting, publicizing and funding parent leadership programs.
- Work side-by-side with parent involvement experts from around the country including Anne T. Henderson, Senior Consultant, Community Involvement Program, Annenberg Institute for School Reform.
- Meet active parent leaders and hear first hand what is working for them at school and district levels.
- Be inspired by success stories from varied communities (rich and poor; urban, suburban and rural).
- Get acquainted with the latest research on how parent involvement makes a difference for kids and with the leverage points in the federal No Child Left Behind Act.
- Work directly with experts to get a head start on planning your own program.
Who Should Attend
· School Districts
· State Departments of Education
· PIRCs
· Community-based Organizations
· Advocacy Groups
· Parent Liaison Programs
· Foundations
· Community Organizers
· Business-Education Coalitions
Organizers
These seminars are hosted by Center for Parent Leadership at the Prichard Committee for Academic Excellence. Sessions will be led by staff and parents from Prichard’s acclaimed Commonwealth Institute for Parent Leadership (CIPL), which since 1997 has trained approximately 1500 Kentucky parent leaders. Today, these leaders are actively and knowledgeably promoting school improvement through their participation on school boards, school site councils and other venues where their voices are heard - and their recommendations are acted on. CIPL is a program of the Prichard Committee for Academic Excellence, which is known nationally for its longstanding success in mobilizing leadership and grassroots support for better schools.
Why Now?
As states and communities implement the testing, accountability and quality teaching requirements of the federal No Child Left Behind Act, and state requirements, the demand for parent leadership has never been greater. Research confirms what common sense suggests: in schools, homes and communities where parents are engaged and involved, students perform better. The stakes have been raised. Additional tools (like detailed school and district performance data) are now available to help parent leaders do their work. We know more than
ever before what works - for students, for parents, for educators, and for communities.
Cost/Registration
$750 per person (before March 20, 2009) includes seminar registration, accommodations, and all meals and materials.
$800 per person (after March 20, 2009) includes seminar registration, accommodations, and all meals and materials.
Accommodations will be booked upon receipt of registration by the Center for Parent Leadership. Our receipt of your registration form indicates your payment responsibility.
LOCATION
Downtown Hilton Hotel
369 W. Vine Street • Lexington, KY 40507
(859) 231-9000
DATES
May 6-7, 2009
CONTACT
Molly Toney
(859) 233-9849 ext. 226
mtoney@prichardcommittee.org
Visit www.CenterForParentLeadership.org for additional details and the seminar agenda.
The George Washington University: Short-Term Study Abroad Course
March 3, 2009 by admin
Filed under ESL Classes
From: Tara Courchaine (taratez@gwu.edu)
SPED 220: International Education and Policy: Implications for Educators
Travel dates: July 22nd-July 31st, 2009
Description: The purpose for this course is for graduate level students to examine educational policy decisions in the areas of curriculum development, teacher training and service delivery in Costa Rica. The program is appropriate for students within the school of education, students interested in sociology, current policy, museum education, individuals with legal backgrounds or those who are interested in the impact of family and culture on learning.
Cost: $4,099.00
The cost of the program includes three credits of tuition, study abroad insurance, and lodging. International airfare and personal expenses are not included.
NOTE: The fees listed are based on estimates and are subject to change. GW reserves the right to cancel this program at any time without notice.
Professor: Dr. Amy Mazur
Contact: Tara Courchaine taratez@gwu.edu
ESOL Students in D.C. Area Narrow Achievement Gap
English language learners have become star pupils in the Washington region, drawing accolades for top-performing schools that serve immigrant communities and showing standout results on state reading tests and national rankings.
From 2003 to 2008, gaps in the pass rates between English learners — pupils designated as having limited English proficiency — and other students narrowed by half on Maryland and Virginia state tests. The latest National Assessment of Educational Progress ranked Virginia’s English learners first in the nation for fourth-grade reading and Maryland’s fifth.
In January, the trade publication Education Week reported that achievement gaps in reading for students of limited English proficiency were smaller in Maryland and Virginia than in most other states. According to D.C. data, English learners in the District’s public schools perform at about the citywide average in reading, which is low but climbing.
Read full story here: washingtonpost.com.
The International Research Foundation (TIRF) for English Language Education: Doctoral Dissertation Grant
February 27, 2009 by admin
Filed under ESL Grants
The International Research Foundation (TIRF) for English Language Education welcomes Doctoral Dissertation Grant (DDG) proposals for 2009. The deadline for submitting a proposal is May 1, 2009. For successful DDG proposals, US $ 5,000 is the maximum award. Full information about the requirements can be found at www.tirfonline.org.
The DDG funding is intended to support worthy applicants who have advanced to candidacy in their doctoral programs and whose dissertation research will address topics which TIRF has prioritized.
This year Doctoral Dissertation Grant (DDG) proposal applications will be considered on any of the following research priorities topics:
(1) the age issue,
(2) the proficiency of English language teachers,
(3) technology in language learning and teaching,
(4) effective grammar instruction,
(5) bilingualism and plurilingualism in business and industry, and
(6) language assessment.
(We regret that we cannot fund research on other topics at this time.)
For full details on what these topics encompass and for information about submitting applications, please visit TIRF’s website: www.tirfonline.org.
Financial crisis hits ESL enrolment
“The global financial crisis is affecting many ESL [English-as-a-Second-Language] schools because learning a new language can be considered a luxury item and affordable to parents when times are good,” he said. “Obviously, there will always be a portion of international students who need to learn a new language. But, the majority of ESL students, particularly international students from Japan and Korea, has declined significantly. This is a common echo for many ESL schools in Vancouver.”
But the story is brighter when it comes to diploma and degree-granting schools, both at his locations in Canada and overseas in China and the Philippines. Said Chu: “Parents are advising their children to stay in school to either earn a degree or learn a trade skill instead of wasting time finding a dead-end job. This trend is positively affecting our international enrolment as some students in China are taking it one step further by enrolling into our overseas diploma or degree programs in Canada from China.”
Read full story via Financial crisis hits ESL enrolment in B.C..
Company’s ESL classes open doors to education
Maria Buezo, 50, doesn’t just take home a paycheck from her job but she’s also mastering the English language - helping her inside and outside the workplace.
At Bal Seal Engineering, a custom engineering company in Foothill Ranch,Buezo and her fellow co-workers enrolled in an English as a second language (ESL) program launched by the company.
The ESL program — which yielded its first group of 49 graduates in late 2008 — is improving communication, cooperation and customer service, Bal Seal officials say. But according to the company, it’s also motivating a large number of participants to continue their pursuit of education outside the workplace.
Read full story via OCRegister.com.
English-only rise in New York City high school graduation rates
Hight school graduation rates have increased under Mayor Bloomberg - except for students not fluent in English.
While the general graduation rate climbed to 52.2% in 2007 from 46.5% in 2005, the rate for students learning English (called English language learners, or ELLs) dropped from 28.5% to 23.5% over the same period.
Advocates say some city efforts that have improved achievement in general missed the mark when it comes to English language learners.
“We support high standards,” said Deycy Avitia, education advocacy coordinator at the New York Immigration Coalition, “but what we need is the increased resources and strategies to make sure they can meet the higher standards.”
Read full article here: English-only rise in New York City high school graduation rates.
Hooked on Obama Phonics
President Obama’s oratory skills have made him an inspiration for thousands of thousands of Japanese trying to learn English, The Wall Street Journal reports. Language schools are using Obama’s speeches to teach their students English and a compilation of his finest oratory has become a best seller, with 480,000 copies sold in three months. One teacher created a six-month course designed to teach Obama’s entire 2004 convention speech, sentence by sentence. His students may be able to wax poetic about the audacity of hope now, but what happens when they need to order a sandwich?
Read it on : Hooked on Obama Phonics - The Daily Beast.
Teachers, tutors try to keep up with demand for ESL classes
Teachers, tutors try to keep up with demand for ESL classes
Frank Helverson, right, a volunteer with Catholic Social Services, teaches English to Jang Wen Yu at Jang’s Hazleton home last week.
Jang “Bobby” Wen Yu and Frank Helverson sat at a table in Jang’s home on Seybert Street in Hazleton as they have regularly for two years to talk.
They discussed employment figures on pie charts, but it’s not the subject that keeps them together —the charts were from the last decade — it’s the language.
English.
Helverson speaks it.
Jang wanted to learn.
Together, after being paired through Catholic Social Services, they worked out a teacher-student relationship that has become a friendship.
Last month, Helverson and his wife attended Jang’s wedding and 12-course reception dinner in New York City’s Chinatown.
At his family’s restaurant, Golden City in Hazleton, Jang manages conversations with customers more easily because of his practice sessions with Helverson.
“My English is getting much better,” he said.
Helverson said he volunteered as a tutor to counteract anti-immigration sentiment he noticed in Hazleton two years ago when the city introduced an Illegal Immigration Relief Act that included English-only provisions.
“I wanted to do something positive. Also I was hearing the wrong notion that immigrants don’t want to learn English,” he said.
In Hazleton, people are waiting in line to learn English.
Interest growing