INTERPRETER VACANCY LEAVES NON-ENGLISH SPEAKING STUDENTS BEHIND
By Rekha Goonesekere 6/6/23
Teachers at Cony High School say students who do not speak English are failing classes, yet hiring classroom translators has been an elusive task and translation technologies continue to fall short.
The Augusta School Department has more than 70 students who do not speak fluent English, but an interpreter for these students has not been hired in almost a year.
“They’ve been advertising for interpreters for years now,” said Maria Sullivan, a teacher with the English Speakers of Other Languages program at Cony High School. “But we don’t get people that come in with the expertise that we need sometimes and the ones that do a good job end up leaving because they get jobs in other places.”
Students speak a wide range of languages, including Arabic, Farsi, Spanish, Thai, Turkish and Portuguese. The school categorizes these students as "English Speakers of Other Languages," or ESOL, learners.
The school relies on a range of technologies to communicate with non-English speaking parents and students.
“We’re struggling a little bit with meeting the needs of each of the students so one person and one language [interpreter] isn’t going to fill that,” Principal Kim Liscomb said. “What we’re doing right now is we’re using the language line offered through the Catholic Charities.”
Teachers can call the language line and ask for an interpreter to help communicate with a student’s parents in a specific language. For announcements, like declaring snow days, ESOL teachers also use "Talking Points," a translation phone app that sends messages to students' phones.
Teachers also have access to pocket translators, which are devices students use in school day-to-day that allow teachers to speak into the device and have the words translated aloud. The pocket translators can be especially useful because some students cannot read in their native language according to Sullivan.
“In classes you’re going to have kids who are below Kindergarten level. They can speak but they have no other training, even in their own language,” Sullivan said.
Most teachers, however, do not have the time to work through language barriers and learning gaps with students one-on-one, Sullivan said.
The job of ESOL teachers is to teach English, so they are not always able to tutor their students for their regular classes, Sullivan said. The ESOL program also lacks education technicians to help students in regular classes: only one of three ed tech positions are filled.
“(ESOL students) are generally failing their classes because they are not able to understand what is being given to them,” Sullivan said. “Any given day is going to be different. You don’t know if they are going to understand you that day or not understand you that day. It’s really rough.”
Students who come to the United States as 10th or 11th graders often go into adult education because they are not able to earn the credits needed to finish the curriculum, according to Principal Liscomb.
“The biggest thing is to immerse (them) in English so they are able to access a job or post-secondary things they want to do,” she said.
Sullivan said the school lacks the translation services they need, though the school is actively looking to hire interpreters.
Principal Liscomb said there may be other solutions to the language barrier other than employing translators in the school. The ESOL program is currently doing an analysis of companies and ways school administrators can communicate with non-English speaking families.
“I don’t think the answer is to get a translator for every person, but I do think there are things we need to do in professional development in our staff,” Liscomb said.
Sullivan said the district needs to have more training of all school staff about how an ESOL child learns and how to help fill the “gap” experienced by students who haven't had a formal education for several years.
“It’s (a gap) that you’re not going to fix in one school year,” she said.
Sullivan said everybody is making an honest effort to help these students.
“As long as everybody keeps working together, we will get them through,” she said.