ESL Program Models and Court Cases: An Overview for Administrators

Abstract

The demographic of our country’s public school students is very diverse and continues to change. By2020, African American, Hispanic, Asian American and Native American groups will account for morethan 40 percent of the U.S. population and this percentage is expected to increase to 50 percent by theyear 2040 (U.S. Census Bureau, 2003). Currently, 46 percent of all schools in the United States haveEnglish Language Learners (ELL) or English as Second Language (ESL) students (National Center forEducational Statistics). Furthermore, Hispanics now make up the largest minority group in the UnitedStates and it’s estimated that by 2021, 25 percent of all students will be Hispanic (Gándara, 2010).These numbers suggest that current and future public school administrators will need to understandeffective ESL/bilingual instruction in order to provide their students and teachers with adequate supportand supervision. Likewise, they will also need to have a basic understanding of educational law as itpertains to ESL and bilingual programming. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to offer anadministrative overview of some of the more salient issues related to the effective instruction of ESLstudents as well to present a summary of prominent course cases-and subsequent rulings-that affectESL instruction.