A publication of the Arlington Education and Employment program(REEP), Office of Career, Technical, and Adult Education, Arlington Public Schools

Volume 9, Issue 3 Fiscal Year 2008/2009 January– march 2009

From the Director: Technology Development

REEP’s continuing commitment to the use of technology in ESL is showcased in two recent projects to provide on-line professional development for our teachers and a complete website with beginning-level practice activities for our students.

On March 7, REEP launched its first completely online Reflective Practice Group, which brings together four teachers for a 13-week project to share lessons, reflect on their teaching, and conduct peer reviews. The group is being co-managed and moderated by Michele Cona, REEP Instructional Technology Coordinator, and Donna Moss, REEP Professional Development Specialist.

The focus of the inquiry-based reflection stems from REEP’s professional development series during FY ’08-’09 entitled “Meeting All Learners’ Needs,” which covered best practices in classroom community building, learner assessment, multilevel and differentiated instruction, and learning preferences.

What’s truly exciting about this project is that it embraces new technologies to address an age-old challenge in adult ESL instruction – how to provide relevant and ongoing professional development to a part-time teaching staff, who work at multiple sites and with staggered schedules. By conducting all activities online, we can more effectively and flexibly provide quality professional development that goes beyond what can be provided in a workshop of several hours.

A critical factor in the successful implementation of this kind of project is the use of a wiki. A wiki is a free, web-based collaborative tool that enables users of a shared site to freely create webpages, start discussion threads, and edit page content, and all requiring just basic word processing skills. In the project, the four teachers -- Margaret Austin Smith, Karli Boothe, Barbara Hicks, and Ruth Sysak – post their lesson plans and peer reviews to the wiki, reacting to what their fellow teachers are doing. The participants, who work at two different sites, were competitively selected and represent a cross section of instructional levels and have varying levels of technology expertise.

The reflective practice project was made possible by a recent donation from the family of Annette Langdon, a former REEP teacher who passed away suddenly last year. Annette was a dedicated ESL professional who showed a passion for using new technologies and for supporting professional development.

So far, the project is proving very effective! The teachers receive weekly feedback on their work and the archive of lesson plans and discussions creates a valuable collection of ideas that will support fellow teachers in their practice. Ultimately, it will inform curriculum development at REEP. It is also our hope that this project serve as a model for future REEP activities, for conducting professional development as well as integrating online instruction and collaboration with our students.

With the goal of improving online ESL offerings for students, work is nearing completion on the student practice activities on REEPworld (www.reepworld.org). Over the past year, we have more than doubled unique, propriety content for REEPworld’s interactive units and have piloted the lessons with our beginning level classes to gather learner feedback. Within the themes of Family, Work, and Health, students watch

Ruth Sysak (left) teaches levels 350-550 non-intensive and Barbara Hicks teaches level 200 intensive, both at

Thomas Jefferson Middle School.

A Comprehensive ESL Program ~ Our Main Objective

The Big Picture

Table 1. Goals and Year-To-Date Progress

Enrollment Goals

Overall County ESL enrollments dipped this quarter from 1,007 during the 2^nd quarter to 925 but are 105 enrollments higher than last year’s third quarter. Overall, this year’s enrollment has held steady with last year except for the continued decline in South Arlington enrollments. To date this year, South Arlington enrollments at Jefferson have decreased by 348 as compared to enrollments at Arlington Mill last year. During the third quarter, there were 36 fewer enrollments than the second quarter; and 112 fewer than the third quarter at Arlington Mill last year.

The demand for scholarships continues to outpace the supply and necessitated denying fifty-four (54) eligible applicants a scholarship during the third quarter, for a total to date of 104 denied applications.

A new non-intensive site, Columbia Grove on South Frederick Street, opened this quarter in collaboration with the Arlington Partnership for Affordable Housing (APAH). Fourteen students enrolled in the first class. (For story, see Page 4.)

Performance Goals

County intensive and non-intensive students completed their courses this quarter at 90%, well exceeding the 65% goal and again demonstrating a high level of student satisfaction. Of the students who completed their courses, 75% attained the course competencies needed to move to the next instructional level. Of all students enrolled (completers and non-completers), 68% attained the course competencies needed to advance to the next instructional level.

Intensive and Non-Intensive ESL Sites

REEP supports Arlington businesses through intensive class workplace vouchers for targeted businesses and on-site workplace instruction. Through a contract with the Arlington Sheriff, REEP also provides ESL for inmates at the Arlington County Detention Facility.

During the 3rd quarter, 32 county voucher students enrolled in intensive instruction -- 27 employees of Arlington hotels, 12 Arlington Public Schools employees, 6 Arlington County Government employees, and 1 employee from the healthcare industry. In addition, the following businesses/agencies sponsored students: Arlington/Alexandria Coalition for the Homeless, Cutter Landscapes, Valcourt Building Services, Clark Construction, Alexandria Presbyterian Church, Arlington Employment Center, Arlington County/Child and Family Services Division, Catholic Diocese of Arlington, Patrick Henry Associates LP, and Columbia Heights 152 Associates LP.

No new on-site workplace classes began during the 3^rd quarter. The airports and the Sheraton remain committed to future classes, but are waiting until the economy begins to improve.

Ethnicity: 74% Hispanic 13% African

6% Pacific Asian 7% Other

Age: 1% 17-18 14% 19-24

65% 25-44 20% 45 older

Gender: 44% Male 56% Female

Educational Background: 16% Less than 7 years of education 53% 7-12 years of education

31% 13 or more years

Employment Status*: 56% Employed full-time

17% Employed part-time

* Employment information is collected from new students upon initial REEP registration and does not reflect changes in employment status during a student’s continued enrollment in the program.

Table 2. Demographic Information

Table 3. Contract Class Enrollment

Table 5. Outreach Center Statistics, January—March 2009

A Comprehensive ESL Program ~ Our Main Objective

The Big Picture

Outreach Center ESL

the Arlington Public Library’s Community Outreach team, gave a presentation at Buckingham Community Center in the morning and evening ESL classes. The presentation included a description of library services, samples of the wide array of materials the library has to offer, and an opportunity for the students to apply for library cards. The library presentations will occur once each quarter. We look forward to extending this partnership to the three other outreach centers.

Finally, REEP extended its Friday evening Open Computer Lab to the students in the outreach ESL program. Since offering this new opportunity, 30 of last quarter’s 110 Open Lab slots were filled by outreach students who appreciate the extra opportunity to practice their English.

The outreach ESL program added additional classes at two of its four locations during the third quarter. After a 6-month hiatus, a Saturday morning class at Harvey Hall is up and running again. An additional morning class was also added to the Fairlington schedule. Fairlington now hosts 3 morning classes each week.

In addition to the increase in classes, the outreach ESL classes also experienced a 32 percent increase in overall attendance from the second quarter. Providing an average of 394 weekly slots, the program exceeded its goals during the third quarter. The program retained every one of its outreach volunteer teachers from the second quarter and added 3 new teachers to the team.

Other exciting news from the outreach centers includes a new partnership with the library and a new tech-related opportunity for outreach students. In March, Mariela Aguilar, a member of

Volunteer Program

Table 4. Outreach Center Goals, January—March 2009

Literacy/Open Lab Stats

Mariela Aguilar from Arlington Public Library gives a presentation at Buckingham Community Center.

REEP’s Open Computer Lab offers students the opportunity to practice and develop their computer skills while learning English at the same time.

The three volunteer orientations held from January to March resulted in 23 new volunteers, for a total of 111 volunteers who worked in the program last quarter. These new volunteers filled positions as literacy teachers, teaching assistants, and outreach teachers at REEP’s many locations. Last quarter, the volunteer program was able to provide 12 teaching assistants to the afternoon and evening intensive classes at Thomas Jefferson and Kenmore, traditionally the most difficult sites to accommodate. Teachers and students alike are pleased with the extra help volunteer teaching assistants provide in the classroom. Under the guidance of Debbie Jones, the Literacy Program continues to provide consistent and high-quality literacy instruction in both the Intensive and Non-Intensive programs. Overall, REEP’s volunteer program had a successful third quarter. Way to go, volunteers!

REEP students are offered literacy intervention instruction and open computer lab as free, supplemental instructional options. This quarter, 17 volunteers assisted 59 students in literacy intervention pull-out groups at Clarendon and Thomas Jefferson. 110 lab slots, with a weekly average of 9 students, were provided Friday evenings at Clarendon for students interested in receiving supplemental language practice in the Clarendon computer lab. Attendance at open lab is up 16 percent from last quarter, due in part to the outreach ESL students taking advantage of the opportunity.

A Comprehensive ESL Program ~ Our Main Objective

The Big Picture

With county support, 967 enrollments were provided in teacher-led classes, and 394 enrollment slots were provided by trained volunteer teachers for a total of 1,361 county enrollments (93 percent of the program total enrollment of 1,464). With federal/state Adult Basic Education (ABE) funding, an additional 103 enrollments (7 percent) were provided. Fifty-one percent (51%) of REEP students studied at the beginning levels (100-250); 38 percent at the intermediate levels (300-450); and 11 percent at the advanced levels (500-650).The following table shows a breakdown by funding and enrollment type.

Program Summary

REEP’s newest site opened in March at Columbia Grove Apartments, in south Arlington. The non-intensive class is being run as a joint effort by REEP and the Arlington Partnership for Affordable Housing (APAH), which owns the 208-unit complex.

The twelve-week, two-night-a-week class will be the first of two classes at Columbia Grove. It’s part of a “family asset building program” for the housing organization, which aims to help its low-income residents avoid financial crises and remain self-sufficient. The program is subsidized by a Citi Foundation grant that provides funding for ESL and financial education classes. Students for the class all are residents of

Program Highlight: Columbia Grove

the complex, located on South Frederick Street, off of Columbia Pike. More than 50 percent of the households at Columbia Grove are non-English speaking, so an ESL component is a logical building block of APAH’s program.

REEP was happy to have the opportunity to partner with APAH because it offers a chance to serve more students in south Arlington close to the Columbia Heights West neighborhood. That area has been underserved since the closing of the Arlington Mill Center last August. A second Columbia Grove class will be offered this summer.

¹See page 2 for a breakdown of individual county-funded program enrollments.

Adult Basic Education

The Adult Basic Education (ABE) is a federal program administered through the Commonwealth of Virginia. This grant provides additional general intensive scholarships as well as targeted scholarships for parents, Arlington employees, students transitioning to REEP from community-based organizations, and upper level students preparing for college or GED programs. To date, 293 ABE tuition and scholarship enrollments have been provided.

Enrollment by Target Group: All Funding Types—3rd Quarter

Scholarships & Vouchers: 338 scholarships and vouchers were provided during the 3^rd quarter, that is, 41 percent of the total intensive enrollment of 820 received financial assistance during the 3rd quarter. 54 eligible scholarship applicants did not receive financial assistance because the demand for scholarships has surpassed available scholarship funding. Of the forty-five (45) intensive workplace vouchers provided, 57 percent were employees of Arlington hotels, 1 percent from health care facilities, 15 percent from Arlington County Government, and 26 percent from Arlington Public Schools.

Parents: One hundred fifty-three (153) parents were enrolled (129 in intensive classes, 24 in non-intensive classes), representing 32 percent of non-intensive and 16 percent of intensive enrollments. Of the intensive parent enrollments, 80 (62%) received scholarships.

Transition: Fourteen (14) scholarships were awarded to students transitioning to intensive classes from Buckingham Outreach Center, Virginia Gardens Outreach Center, ESL Ministries, and REEP non-intensive classes.

²Classes that begin during the 1st quarter continued in the 2nd quarter.

Community Links ~ Facilitating access to community information and involvement

Staff News

REEP Happenings

Workshops and Training

On January 30, Arlington school board member, Dr. Emma Violand-Sanchez, led an in-service for REEP teachers, coordinators, and instructional assistants at Thomas Jefferson Middle School. The in-service was the fourth in a series of workshops on meeting all learners’ needs. Participants gained a better understanding of their own learning style by completing a learning styles inventory. Dr. Violand-Sanchez discussed the concept of learning styles in relation to the stages of learning. Participants had the opportunity to practice developing lessons that help students learn through their preferred style and build new skills in learning.

On February 7, REEP coordinators and teachers from the CEC intensive program and Thomas Jefferson non-intensive program participated in an all-day TESOL conference, Building a Culture of Peace, at George Mason University. REEP participants attended sessions on integrating language teaching with social responsibility and conflict resolution.

Phil Cackley and Emily Becketti presented the Foundations of Teaching and Assessing Reading workshop at CEC on February 21. Workshop participants discussed the knowledge and skills important to the reading process, identified elements of a good reading lesson, and practiced creating comprehensive and interactive reading lessons.

The Virginia Adult Learning Resource Center (VALRC) presented the workshop, Technology Resources You and Your Students Will Love, on February 28 at CEC. The workshop was attended by REEP teachers and volunteers, and teachers from other ESOL programs in Northern Virginia.

On March 12, Suzanne Grant and Emily Becketti attended a

50^th anniversary symposium organized by the Center for Applied Linguistics (CAL). The symposium panelists spoke on the topics of language diversity and language and opportunity.

On March 17, REEP coordinators participated in a training on the REEP Writing Assessment (RWA) conducted by Pat Thurston.

Publications

Thomas Jefferson non-intensive teacher, Ruth Sysak, co-authored a paper titled, Meeting the Mental Health Needs of English Language Learners in Public Schools. The paper was published by the George Washington University Graduate School of Education in a collection of papers on the No Child Left Behind legislation and its impact on student mental health issues.

Meetings

Suzanne Grant and Mary Duncan Wadsworth attended the Latino Lunch Connection March 10.

Phil Cackley gave a presentation on REEP to adolescents and their parents at a juvenile court program March 14 at Langston Community Center.

Emily Becketti attended the Northern Virginia Regional Literacy Coordinating Committee meeting on March 16.

On March 18, Donna Moss attended a meeting of the Arlington Service Providers to the Poor. The topic of the meeting was the housing and foreclosure crisis.

On March 23, Michele Cona visited a parenting class at the Berkley, an AHC Inc. property. Michele talked to the parents about the Family unit on REEPworld.org.

Guest Speakers

On March 18, the 500 and 550 morning classes at CEC had a visit from Elenor Hodges, executive director of Arlingtonians for a Clean Environment (ACE). Elenor spoke and answered questions about recycling in Arlington, an issue students had studied during a unit on the Environment.

Representatives from two immigrant service organizations, Just Neighbors and The Ethiopian Community Development Council (ECDC), visited CEC at the end of March to meet students, present information about their services, and answer questions.

Field Trips

As part of a unit on the Great Depression and New Deal, Paul McCabe’s morning 550 class visited the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial in the Tidal Basin. Students prepared for the trip by reading about FDR and the creation of the memorial. During their visit, they participated in a scavenger hunt and practiced paraphrasing the quotations that are scattered

throughout the four outdoor “rooms” of the memorial.

In March, Phil Cackley’s morning 200 class and Karli Boothe’s morning 250 class visited the National Air and Space Museum. During the visit, students learned about the Wright Brothers and the history of airplanes.

To practice what they studied in the Community Unit, Judy Keating’s 150 morning class planned a visit to the National Museum of the American Indian. On March 26, students took public transportation to the museum. During their trip, they practiced describing the exhibits and objects in the museum. Eleven REEP classes visited the public library this quarter. Students toured facilities, applied for library cards, and participated in the Read & Discuss program.

Paul McCabe’s 550 class at the FDR Memorial in Washington D.C.

REEP Spotlight

The REEP Quarterly Editorial staff: Suzanne Grant, Phil Cackley, Robert Mello. Contributors: Emily Becketti, Michele Cona, Nancy Ferguson, Suzanne Grant, Debbie Jones, Lillian Quinteros, Natalia Rios and Mary Duncan Wadsworth.

The Arlington Public Schools prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, national origin, age, disability, pregnancy or marital status.

Success Story ~ Biruk Shuku

supervisor or coworkers about them. So when he saw a flyer at Hudson News advertising a workplace English class for National Airport workers, Biruk jumped at the opportunity.

Through 15 weeks of classes twice a week, Biruk became more self-confident, made many good friends and developed lifeskills to participate in the greater airport community. He assisted other students in his class who were struggling, and he enjoyed being able to ask his teacher about new expressions he had heard during the week. Biruk began to concentrate on his writing and participated in several out-of-class writing activities. As weeks passed, his manager and coworkers noticed a definite improvement in Biruk’s spoken English as well as a greater self confidence.

Biruk successfully completed the Workplace class in June 2008. He and eight of his classmates were invited by Westfield Concession Management (the concession management company that had contracted with REEP) to attend their tenant’s meeting and receive their certificates of completion. When his

teacher asked if he would like to say a few words, he was apprehensive about speaking in public. But then he decided this would be a wonderful opportunity to share with the airport managers how much his English class had meant to him. He could not say only a few words; instead, he went home and wrote a speech.

When the class finished, Biruk spoke in front of 20 managers and several executives from Westfield Concession Management. His speech was so well-done and eloquent, it earned him a standing ovation and much praise from the attendees at the meeting. It was a proud moment for Biruk; as he commented, “I am a better individual for taking this course.”

Shortly after he finished his class, he took a second job at the American Store at National Airport. Today, Biruk works hard at his jobs, continues to study, and is proud of himself for all that he has been able to achieve in the past year. We are proud of him, too!

When Biruk Shuku first heard about the REEP Workplace English class at Reagan National Airport last year, he had no idea what to expect. What he did know was that he needed to improve his English to communicate more effectively with his customers and fellow workers at Hudson News.

With the help of the REEP class, Biruk was able to go from having little confidence in his English to being able to write and present his own speech in front of a group of airport managers.

A native of Nepal, Biruk started working at National Airport in 2007. He had only been in the United States for a year and although he did have some English skills, he wasn’t confident about understanding spoken English. There were still many cultural concepts about workplace expectations in the United States that he didn’t fully understand, and he often wasn’t comfortable asking his

Arlington Education and Employment Program (REEP)

2801 Clarendon Blvd., Room 218
Arlington, VA 22201

Phone: 703-228-4200 Fax: 703–527-6966

Check out REEP on-line:

www.reepworld.org

REEP is a grant-funded special project of the Arlington Public Schools’ Office of Career, Technical, and Adult Education (CTAE). As part of the public school system, REEP is a tax-exempt organization. The following are specific needs of our program:

a Tax-deductible donations for scholarships and classroom resources

a Daytime and evening volunteers! (2-3 hours a day, one day a week)

Help Wanted: Challenges & Opportunities

animations of personal stories and complete vocabulary and comprehension activities. The stories were written by REEP teachers, funded in part by an EL/Civics grant in 2005. The narratives are composites of the hundreds of real-life experiences that students have shared with us over the years. The result is a truly engaging experience for students, which contextualizes vocabulary and grammar practice in situations they consistently remark as similar to their own experiences.

In the past several months, REEP has sought to expand the reach of REEPworld by making presentations on its use to other service providers in Arlington. We have partnered with the Arlington Public Library to provide free workshops called “Learn English on the Internet” to participants at the library’s Saturday morning conversation classes. Also in March, we started conducting workshops at various sites within the AHC, Inc. affordable housing property group, which cover such topics as parenting issues (Family Unit) and goal setting (Work Unit), using the website as a resource.

These strategic partnerships are, we believe, win-win-win! Community members are receiving skills and information they need through county service providers they trust, our partner organizations are getting assistance that REEP can uniquely provide, and REEP can conduct effective outreach, which is critical to our program needs. We are excited about the possibilities these strategic partnerships offer and we welcome the opportunity to partner with more organizations in the future!

- Michele Cona, instructional technology coordinator (for Suzanne Grant, director)

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Biruk Shuku

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