Creating a Formula for Success: Why English Language Learner Students Are Dropping Out of School, and How to Increase Graduation Rates

This report uses school data and student focus groups to assess why increasing numbers of English language learners (ELLs) in New York City dropped out of school after the state adopted higher graduation standards. Recommendations include: 1) targeting middle and high schools where 248 ELLS are underperforming; 2) implementing new strategies to reach students at high risk because they arrive in the United States as teenagers; 3) improving instruction in both ESL and core classes as well as increasing the number of teachers certified for ESL and bilingual instruction; 4) implementing a language access policy to enable immigrant parents to participate more actively in their children's education.

Analyzes 2000 Census data on languages spoken at home by school-age children in newcomer families, and finds that English is almost universally accepted by the children and grandchildren of the immigrants who have come to the United States in great numbers since the 1960s, similar to earlier generations of immigrants.

This report, part of a series that presents population and housing data collected in the 2000 Census, Ppresents data on language spoken at home and the ability of people ages five and over to speak English. I t describes population distributions and characteristics for the United States, as well as regions, states, counties, and selected places with populations of 100,000 or more.