This article draws on a 23 month ethnographic study of an emerging--newly established and rapidly growing--Latino community in the New Latino Diaspora of the U.S. in order to examine how educators and parents interpret language education policy (LEP). It analyzes how an English as a Second Language director and one undocumented Mexican mother…

This article discusses the effect of Arizona's language policies on school districts serving Native American students. Although these policies were designed to restrict the access of Spanish-speaking immigrant and citizen students to bilingual education programs, their reach has extended into schools and school districts serving Native Americans.…

Approximately five million English Language Learners (ELLs) attend public schools in the United States. Because the majority of ELLs tend to live in immigrant families, schools become the means to provide ELLs with the English skills necessary to be competent in school and in life. Federal and state policies regarding instructional arrangements…

This research explores the development of landmark federal language policy in the United States: the Native American Languages Act of 1990/1992 (NALA). Overturning more than two centuries of United States American Indian policy, NALA established the federal role in preserving and protecting Native American languages. Indigenous languages in the…

The "No Child Left Behind Act" establishes federal education policy for the United States, with a heavy focus on accountability through high-stakes testing. Provisions specific to English language learners (ELLs) include the mandate for their inclusion in state math tests, even for newcomer students enrolled for less than one year. Most ELLs take…

"No Child Left Behind" (NCLB, 2001) fails to recognize English as a second language (ESL) as a specialized academic discipline in which teachers should be "highly qualified." In this paper we examine the impact of this policy failure on the practice of teachers of K-12 English language learners (ELLs), particularly in the context of reading…

We argue here that the combination of U.S. federal education policy as embodied in the "No Child Left Behind Act of 2001" with the passage of a California state initiative that required that "nearly all classroom instruction [be] in English...for a period not normally intended to exceed one year" in 1998 created a "perfect storm" for English…

This report reveals the problems with claims made by Arizona state public education officials that English Language Learners (ELLs) are thriving under English-only instruction. The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB) and the state's accountability system, Arizona LEARNS, require all students, including ELLs, to participate in statewide…

This survey of third-grade teachers of English Language Learners (ELLs) in Arizona regarding school language and accountability policies--Proposition 203 (a voter-initiative that restricts the use of bilingual education programs in Arizona schools), the federal No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB), and Arizona LEARNS (the state's high-stakes…