House Committee to Study Immigrant Needs for WASL

© 2006 OCA-Greater Seattle

OCA - GREATER SEATTLE CHAPTER

EMBRACING THE HOPES AND ASPIRATIONS OF CHINESE AND ASIAN PACIFIC AMERICANS IN THE UNITED STATES

by Richard Bergeon


Students will soon have to pass the Washington Assessment of Student Learning (WASL) in order to receive their high school diploma. Recognizing that this requirement will be impossible for many recent immigrant students to meet, Representative Dave Upthegrove (33rd district) introduced a bill (HB2037) to get them help which OCA-GS was happy to support. The bill was  supported by representatives Santos, Kenney, Hudgins, B. Sullivan, McCoy, Roberts and Hasegawa.

HB2037 focuses on immigrant students that are eligible for the state's transitional bilingual program and looks for ways for them to continue to pursue a high school diploma after the twelfth grade. Options might include allowing them to attend an integrated program of academic and language skills development offered by a community college or technical college.

The bill calls for the state board for community and technical colleges and the office of the superintendent of public instruction to design one or more options to address the educational needs of recent immigrant high school students by no later than the beginning of the 2006-07 school year.

In the 2006-07 school year, they will work with community and technical colleges to pilot one or more approaches. The pilot is to include at least two school districts (one east and one west of the mountains), and will also focus on two different types of recent immigrant student groups, one that shares a common first language, and one that does not. Statewide implementation is to begin in the 2008-09 school year. The bill also creates a joint select committee on immigrant education.

The forecast cost by fiscal budget cycle is: 2005-07 < $.5mm; 2007-09 $13mm; 2009-11 $31mm. Passage of the bill is far from assured in this period of fiscal difficulties for the state and many local school districts.

It has already been established by educators that standardized tests are traditionally unfair to minorities, lower economic classes, and immigrants. It is imperative that we find a way to rectify any injustice built into the state of Washington's yet to be proven testing system.