This notice is a reminder asking everyone in the education community to take a few minutes to complete a survey on how to identify English learners and when to exit English learners from service. Take the Survey Now
Under the Every Student Succeeds Act, states are required to establish a uniform method of identifying and reclassifying English learners. Although Maine currently has these uniform procedures, it has been more than a decade since Maine has made any amendments to its Home Language Survey, and it was in 2013 that Maine underwent its latest data study to review English learners’ performance on academic assessments and their correlating WIDA ACCESS for ELLs scores. With the administration of the new ACCESS for ELLs 2.0 and changes in academic assessments, the Maine Department of Education is taking this opportunity to elicit public input, along with data, to determine the best methods to ensure a valid and reliable identification procedure as well as fair and appropriate exit criteria. To begin the process, here is a brief survey to help guide the Department. Take the Survey Now
In addition, please feel free to reach out directly to Maine DOE’s ESL Consultant April Perkins at april.perkins@maine.gov or 441-9043 to share additional thoughts, comments and suggestions not captured by the survey.
For more information about educational or English language acquisition services for English learners to ESL/Bilingual Programs, contact Maine DOE’s Director of ESL/Bilingual Programs Nancy Mullins at nancy.mullins@maine.gov or 624-6788.