ESSA and How It Impacts ELLs

Educational Policy and ELLs
In 2015, President Obama signed the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), which re-affirmed the civil rights law obligated schools to ensure that ELLs have equal access to education (NCELA, 2016; Colorin Colorado, 2017). The same concept underlining this Act was previously found in the No Child Left Behind policy. The effect that this policy has had on the education of is that it has helped to ensure that ELLs receive fair treatment in schools and receive the help they require.
Because ELLs come from a foreign environment and culture, they are more likely to require special assistance when it comes to acquiring the L2. Their familiarity with the new surroundings and the manner of expressions is less than a learner who has been raised in the native environment.
Some specific ways that the policy has helped ELLs is that it has taken into consideration that situation substantially. For instance, as Colorin Colorado (2017) reports, there are now requirements that schools establish statewide exit and entrance procedures for ELLs and that schools provide more focus on multilingualism to help students retain their L1 as they learn their L2. Schools enhancing their ability to monitor ELL progress is also a major development that has been supported by the policy of ESSA.
Furthermore, as the American Federation of Teachers (2016) points out: ESSA provides states with two new options when it comes to giving ELLs more time in terms of holding them accountable as they learn the L2:
· For one year, exclude the student from taking the reading/English language arts test and from counting results of either or both the math and English language arts tests; OR
· For the first year of the student’s enrollment in a U.S. school, report on but exclude from accountability system the results on these tests; for the second year of enrollment, include a measure of student growth on both tests; and for the third year of enrollment, include proficiency on both tests in the accountability system.
These options allow ELLS to have greater chance of academic success and overall improvement of education by allowing them to take some time to catch up with their peers before they are assessed at the same level.
Gaps still exist, however, because even though these policies offer guidance, schools vary in terms of resources and the kinds of attention they can give to ELLs—so not every school will be as efficient in supplying ELLs with the kind of service and education they need. Yet, as Ferguson (2016) notes, “states now have far more autonomy to determine how schools are held accountable for student performance” (p. 72), which means that the onus is now on states to make sure that the school systems are responding to the needs of ELLs and ensuring that accountability practices are in line with guidance given at the federal level.
The good thing about ESSA is that it reaffirms the state and federal government’s dedication to the education of individuals who are in need of more attention because of their unique circumstances. ELLs certainly fit into this and what ESSA allows to happen is that the students can now take the time they need to focus on learning the language without having to meet standards or pass tests, which is also important to monitoring success—but in the beginning can be too burdensome.

References
American Federation of Teachers. (2016). Retrieved from
http://www.aft.org/sites/default/files/essa_ells.pdf
Colorin Colorado. (2017). Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) and English language
learners. Retrieved from http://www.colorincolorado.org/ell-basics/ell-policy-research/ell-laws-regulations/essa-ells
Ferguson, M. (2016). Washington View: ESSA is more than the latest acronym on
education’s block. Phi Delta Kappan, 97(6), 72-73.
NCELA. (2016). Legal obligations. Retrieved from http://www.ncela.us/faqs/view/6