English Language Learners (ELL) are students who speak a language other than English at home and enter the public school system without any or a limited comprehension of the English language.
The number of ELL students continues to grow every year. Based on 2009-2010 data from the NYC Department of Education, 5% of ELL students are enrolled in charter schools. Some charter schools have a significantly high percentage of English language learners. For example, the Family Life Academy Charter School has a 33.3% ELL enrollment; Icahn 4 Charter School has almost 23% ELL enrollment; and New Heights Academy Charter School has a 20% ELL enrollment rate (2009-10 Limited English Proficiency data, NYC Department of Education). These are just a few examples of charter schools with a significant ELL population and NYC charter schools will continue to increase the number of ELL students they serve.
While it is important that public charter schools make greater efforts to serve more ELL students, the emphasis should be on the quality of instruction. There is no question that there is much to be done to improve services to, and recruitment of, ELL students in public charter schools. New provisions in the Education Law have correctly focused attention on this issue and the New York City Charter School Center is advocating for charter schools to be able to give ELL preference in its enrollment process.
The Charter Center has also established a partnership with NYU Steinhardt's Spanish Bilingual Education Technical Assistant Center (SBETAC) to provide professional development opportunities for all charter schools so that they can best serve their ELL students. The Charter Center's ELL Consortium launched in the summer of 2009 with 12 charter schools and one Charter Management Organization (CMO) participating.
