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Schools Feel Teacher Crunch as Number of Foreign Students Grows

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Many of the foreign children who enroll in public schools speak at least some English, but others do not understand a word of what is being taught in the classroom. Until now, individual school districts have had the task of recruiting and funding teachers and tutors to help.

The Department of Education reported 2,279 students in public schools last year who spoke limited English. Just 111 teachers in the state had some kind of qualification to work with those students, according to figures by the Mississippi Teachers Center.

The disparity could grow as more non-English speaking families move into the area. The state's Hispanic and Asian populations in particular have boomed. The 2000 census recorded 39,569 Hispanics in the state, compared with 15,931 recorded in the 1990 census. Likewise, the state's Asian population shot up from 3,203 to 23,281 in the same period.

In Jackson schools last year, 129 students in the district needed ESL classes. Teaching them is tough. They are distributed among just four teachers. They come from widely varied cultures and languages: Latin America, Russia, Vietnam, China, India. A group of 40 middle school and high school students speak a Sudanese dialect called Dinka.

One teacher taught 40 ESL students while also teaching Spanish classes, said ESL teacher Janice Cate. Another teacher holds classes at two schools each day.

Out of Cate's 23 students, 12 speak no English, she said. Among them are the five adopted children from Russia and Ukraine. Students like the Field children have a long way to go until they can learn at a level with others in the school, but they are making progress. Cate hopes that by the end of the school year, the Fields will be able to read and speak some basic English.

Jackson's ESL program has been in place for years, but some school districts have been caught off guard by foreign speakers enrolling in their schools. In Lowndes County, the construction of a power plant attracted laborers and their families from outside the state this year. Twenty-six nonnative speakers showed up for class August. The district had no qualified teachers who could help them, said Bobbi Vaughn, elementary coordinator for the district.

Vaughn appealed to the school board, saying some of the new students understood nothing going on in class. The board approved funds for a tutor. In the meantime, a local couple, Wade and Gail Ward volunteered to tutor the students three days a week.

``It's going to take time, but we've already seen (progress) in a couple of weeks with the younger children,'' said Wade Ward. ``Just being immersed in this culture is going to help them.''

With the rising number of ESL students, state lawmakers have gotten into the act. The legislature passed a bill this year creating a special teaching license for bilingual education. The license will allow multilingual speakers to become teachers without going through the standard certification process, which can take four years.

The new license will be available next summer, but teachers are not convinced that it will solve the problem. Daphne Buckley, director of the Mississippi Teachers Center, the state is having difficulty attracting all kinds of teachers, and recruiting bilingual teachers is a low priority.

The biggest obstacle in recruiting is the low pay, Buckley said. Last year, Mississippi ranked 48th in the country in teacher salaries, according to the National Education Association's 2001 rankings.

``We know there is a need for special education teachers,'' she said. ``We're just looking for good teachers and right now it's hard for us.''

But the new license is not meant to attract teachers from outside the area, said Steve Williams, the special assistant to the superintendent of the state Department of Education. The license will open the door to already in the state with the language skills to help non-English speakers.

``What (the license) will hopefully do is provide an additional mechanism for those who express an interest,'' Williams said.

In the meantime, teachers and school districts will make do. In Jackson, the number of ESL students has leveled off. Cate attributes that to many new families settling in nearby counties. Cate said they expect it will be a short reprieve, though.

``We may not be prepared for hundreds to come in, but we've been prepared,'' she said.