At Monday evening’s regular meeting of Amarillo Independent School District Board of Trustees, board members heard reports on the growing number of English as a Second Language (ESL) students and how they are working with the situation.
Coordinator Sylvia Hughes told the board Dec. 8 that 24% of students in Texas are ESL, and in Amarillo, the number is 19%. Spanish is the primary language for most of those students, with the second being Somali, according to her information. She discussed the number of teachers and programs involved in teaching English to these students.
Hughes explained the difference in the terms used to describe these groups — multilingual learners, Emergent Bilingual (EB) students and ESL students…