The mission of Whitfield County Schools is to increase student learning by providing students and staff with meaningful, challenging, and engaging educational experiences in a safe and supportive environment. We believe that staff should have a unified focus and that our students are the ultimate beneficiaries of our common effort. We also believe that teachers are instructional leaders and designers of learning experiences which are tailored to the unique learning and motivational needs of our particular group of students. Parents and community personnel also are a vital part of our work, and we believe that all students deserve a safe, non-threatening learning environment where they are treated with dignity and respect. English Learners are certainly among the beneficiaries of this conceptual framework.
The education of English Learners is a shared responsibility among the regular education teacher and ESOL teachers. Collaboration among teachers and administrative support/leadership are all necessary ingredients for student success. In order to provide high quality and effective instruction to English Learners, we believe that both their English development needs and academic content needs must be considered by effectively scaffolding instruction. Program effectiveness is based on a continual improvement model where current practices are evaluated in response to student achievement data. Program improvements incorporate those practices deemed most effective in the professional body of research. For this reason, on-going professional learning opportunities are essential for all educators who interact with English Learners.
The district complies with all state and federal guidelines related to the education of English Learners. While we understand that compliance is a necessary factor, we consider such compliance to be the minimum expectation. We seek continual improvement because we invest in the lives of students and wish to offer the best practices available to English Learners because we believe that their education leads to increased opportunities in the future.
While it is possible that some districts might view English Learners as being deficient in language skills, we take the additive view that ELs enrich the curriculum for all students by adding a global perspective to classroom discussions and learning tasks. Though ELs sometimes lack the prior knowledge that we expect based on our own cultural perspectives, they offer a rich dialogue regarding experiences that bring our curriculum to life. The presence of ELs also challenges our teachers to continually improve their instructional methodology and by doing so, all students benefit from the research-based methods in place.
The goals of the ESOL Program are to value and build upon students’ academic, linguistic and cultural backgrounds; provide a supportive learning environment; assist students in reaching their full academic potential; build connections between ESOL and school-wide instructional programs; encourage participation of students and their families within the school and community; and to foster understanding and appreciation of diverse populations within the school and the community.
Additional ESOL information is available at the GA Department of Education website.
