116 3rd St SE
Cedar Rapids, Iowa 52401
Schools see increase in English learner students
College Community district creates a ‘newcomer’ class for high schoolers, expands English learner program to a fifth elementary school
Oct. 11, 2024 5:00 am, Updated: Oct. 14, 2024 3:22 pm
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CEDAR RAPIDS — Prairie High School teacher Carry Miller believes she has “the absolute best kids in the school” in her “newcomer” class for immigrant and refugee students learning English.
One of Miller’s favorite questions to ask her students is how many of them have owned chickens. She wants them to feel more connected across cultures and recognize how much they have in common, she said.
“I always am surprised by what I get to teach every day,” Miller said. “My classroom is one of the places they feel comfortable speaking out. These are the kind of students that really want to learn.”
About 30 students are in the newcomer class. Most of them have lived in the United States less than two years.
The College Community School District has had more than a 400 percent increase in students who qualify for English learner services in the past decade.
Today, the district has 442 students, speaking about 40 languages, in the English learner program, compared to 102 students in the 2015-16 school year.
The English learners represent about 7.5 percent of the district’s 5,800 students.
In the past two years, about 15 percent of incoming kindergarten students qualified for English learner services, said Laura Medberry, the district’s executive director of learning Supports. This year, that’s 65 first-graders and 56 kindergartners.
To accommodate those students, the district expanded its English learner program to the fifth of its five elementary schools.
Numbers increase
English learners are among the fastest-growing populations in Iowa schools at over 6 percent and rising. That compares to 10 percent of the student population nationwide.
The Cedar Rapids Community School District has just over 1,500 students, from 65 countries, in its English learner program. The Iowa City Community School District has about 1,900 English learner students, speaking 62 languages.
An English learner is a student in the process of acquiring English proficiency and has a first language other than or in addition to English, according to the Iowa Department of Education.
The English learner status remains with a student until they show proficiency in listening, speaking, reading and writing in English; are successful in the classroom where there is language instruction; and are able to actively participate in the classroom.
Afghani population
Partially contributing to the College Community district’s increase in English learner students is the number of refugees from Afghanistan who began to arrive in Cedar Rapids in October 2021, according to Renae Popelar, interim director of refugee and immigrant services at the Catherine McAuley Center, a Cedar Rapids nonprofit that provides services for refugees and immigrants.
Thousands of people fled their homes to escape the Taliban after the fall of Kabul in 2021. Cedar Rapids welcomed 249 of the about 70,000 refugees who came to the U.S. over a three-week period that fall, Popelar said.
Many of these families found housing in southwest Cedar Rapids, which is within the College Community School District. Other families followed, to “go where community is,” Popelar said.
“Iowa is the reason there’s a resettlement program in the U.S.,” said Anne Dugger, interim executive director of the McAuley Center.
The state’s long history of welcoming refugees started with former Iowa Gov. Robert D. Ray leading efforts to resettle Tai Dam refugees in the 1970s after they fled Vietnam, Dugger said.
“This is something we should be very proud of,” said Dugger, also referencing the immigration of Czech people to Iowa in the 1850s. “We have a history of immigration here in this city. Our entire community was built on immigrants and refugees.
“This is important for our community, city, state and nation to continue to grow new people and new ideas.”
Today, about 680 adults from 62 countries are learning English at the McAuley Center.
“It’s humbling. I can’t imagine moving somewhere and learning another language,” Popelar said.
‘Safe and caring’
Lisa Klein, an English learner consultant with Grant Wood Area Education Agency, said there are more than 4,000 English learner students in the AEA’s seven-county region, with the majority in Linn and Johnson counties.
The AEA works with schools to identify students as English learners and support English learners and the teachers delivering instruction to those students. English learners are not special education students, but they can receive special education services if needed.
Zeinab Osman, a community engagement specialist for the College Community district, works closely with English learner students and their families. Osman said she came to the U.S. from Sudan, “without a word of English,” when she was 8 years old.
Osman said she encourages families to maintain their cultural traditions and speak their home language.
“That fear I can sense with our families now is they don’t want their kids to lose their culture,” she said.
The district works to support any needs families might have and connect them with appropriate community resources, Osman said.
Krista Oehlerich, who teaches English learner students at Prairie View Elementary in the College Community district, said it’s easier for the younger students to learn English.
She works with students on first speaking English, especially social vocabulary, so they can communicate in the classroom and with their peers.
“The adjustment period may take a while,” Oehlerich said. “Our job as teachers is to provide them a safe and caring environment, so they want to start learning and using English.”
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