Ensuring Equity for English Language Learners in Providence Schools

According to the National Education Association (NEA), English language learners (ELLs) are the US’ fastest-growing student group, currently making up 10% of K-12 students. The NEA predicts that by 2025, the number of ELLs nationwide will grow to 1 out of every 4 students – an exciting and challenging shift.

With over 400 languages spoken by K-12 students across the country, creating educational equity for ELLs is not a want – it’s a need.

The Challenge

Across the Providence Public School District (PPSD) in Rhode Island’s capital, ELLs knock the national average out of the park, making up 31% of the 20K+ student population. 

Because of the larger-than-average ELL population, PPSD leadership knew that the path toward creating equitable learning experiences for learners had to begin with providing equitable support for their teachers. To effectively meet the unique needs of ELLs, district leaders made it a priority to first ensure that they had sufficient English as a Second Language (ESL) Certified teachers and support staff across the entire district.

In partnership with engage2learn (e2L) at the start of the 2021-2022 school year, district leaders and stakeholders worked to create a coaching and growth plan designed to equip educators to equitably support ELLs through streamlined district-wide priorities, goals, teacher training, and instructional methods.

The Strategic Solution

With clear, unified goals, PPSD leadership collaborated with e2L to design a new Multilingual Learners (MLL) Best Practices Rubric to serve as a guide for educators toward mastering 12 competencies aligned to instructional best practices, including:

• Differentiation and Scaffolding
• Culture, Environment, and Professional Ethics
• Problem-Solving, Creativity, and Innovation
• Language Proficiency and Vocabulary Development

With each best practice scaffolded into four levels of proficiency, hundreds of PPSD teachers across the district began to use the rubric as a tool for celebrating their strengths and identifying areas for improvement.

Through personalized goal setting and regularly scheduled 1:1 coaching conversations with their personal Certified e2L Data-Informed Growth Coach using GroweLab, e2L’s all-in-one instructional coaching and talent development platform, teachers turned their attention to improving student engagement, achievement, and life-ready skills for ELLs across all language proficiency and grade levels.

Following an 80/20 instructional coaching model, coaches spend 80% of their time in the classroom assisting teachers with practical implementation and 20% of their time in 1:1 coaching conversations with teachers. 

Challenging the traditional observation-feedback cycle, coaching conversations involve both the instructional coach and coachee in tracking progress, problem solving, exchanging ideas, and celebrating accomplishments by using classroom implementation and work sample evidence to show teacher mastery of competencies. 

With GroweLab, coaches document the ideas, outcomes, and evidence of improved classroom practices resulting from these 1:1 conversations. That information is transformed into an easy-to-use data analytics and reporting dashboard, giving district leaders clear, actionable insight into ongoing educator growth.

This process allows for intentional, capacity-building training that gives teachers the tools they need to influence student achievement; the opportunity to develop strong, trusting relationships between instructional coaches and coachees; and the ability for school and district leaders to show stakeholders that the investment in educator growth is actually having a positive impact on ELL students.

“We didn’t have the capacity with our in-house coaches to meet the need before. Now we’re using engage2learn to support us and our teachers through one-on-one coaching centered on the practices that teachers are now implementing in the classroom.” 

Jennifer Efflandt, Executive Director of Multilingual Learners, Providence Public School District

Additionally, e2L developed a series of asynchronous online courses that connect directly to the designed competencies in order to ensure alignment between the ongoing coaching efforts and the district’s existing professional development on sheltered content. Courses such as “Effective Reading Comprehension Strategies for ELLs” and “Using the WIDA Writing Rubric to Inform Instruction” are available on-demand to coachees in GroweLab's robust resource library and include opportunities for self-reflection, actionable strategies, and challenges for taking next steps in the classroom.

The Outcome

As of this writing, PPSD coachees have collectively earned over 1,500 badges and microcredentials on instructional best practices and competencies for ELLs since e2L coaching began in November 2021. Earned in GroweLab during coaching conversations, badges represent each teachers’ hard work, dedication, and progress in the classroom. Even as the district awaits EOY assessment results, the immense evidence of educator growth – an early indicator of student achievement – in such a short period of time signals that improved ELL outcomes data is to follow.

The PPSD community is committed to creating a culture of educational equity that meets the needs of every single ELL. With job-embedded training, tangible instructional tools, scalable best practices, and celebrations of growth every step of the way, teachers are well on their way toward creating a lifelong, positive impact on their students.

"The idea of having a coach was new to many teachers, so at the beginning, we did experience some resistance and hesitation. Initially, some teachers had the feeling that they were getting a coach because they were doing something wrong or that they were in trouble. That’s decreased significantly. As a district we had to change our mindset and understand that every single teacher benefits from coaching.”

Jennifer Efflandt, Executive Director of Multilingual Learners, Providence Public School District

2021-2022 Cumulative Educator Growth

Number of growth indicators completed by best practice standard and month (source: GroweLab)

2021-2022 Instructional Competency Growth

Badges earned through evidence of competency (source: GroweLab)