Program Overview

The number of limited-English-speaking families seeking enrollment in our district has increased significantly in recent years. These families include students born in the U.S. but whose first language is other than English, as well as immigrants, migrants, and refugees with little or no English proficiency and sometimes formal interrupted education. Our program aims to meet the need of this population in our district by offering these students and their families a culturally responsive and safe environment where they can feel empowered in their new beginning and part of our community.

As research shows, newcomers need support to adapt to a new society and culture, and in this case, to acquire academic English that will facilitate mastery of the content standards in school. The “newcomer” term here is defined as any foreign-born student who has recently migrated to the U.S. and whose first language is other than English. Therefore, a newcomer faces various challenges to navigate a new educational system effectively without appropriate instruction and classroom accommodations. These students are at a higher risk of dropping out of school and may consequently have reduced opportunities for employment.

The U.S. Departments of Education (ED) and Justice (DOJ) released joint guidance on January 7, 2015, reminding states, school districts, and schools of their obligations under federal law to ensure that English Learners have equal access to high-quality education and opportunities to achieve their full academic potential. The goal of this newcomers program is to ensure that these students become familiar with U.S. culture and history, that they develop enough language proficiency to feel comfortable communicating in social and academic settings, and that their academic performance meets the expectations of our school district. In our program, English learners have the opportunity to earn sufficient academic credits to graduate in a timely manner by participating in shelter instruction and with the support of a paraprofessional who speaks their first language.

This curriculum has been developed with a multi-age and multi-grade group in mind. Our curriculum has been designed to be flexible in order to accommodate students with no English language knowledge (MLs), students with limited or interrupted formal education (SLIFE), and late arrivals throughout the whole school year. In addition, our curriculum also contains resources to support students with career-ready and technology integration skills for life impact. 

Students are expected to follow the BCS Code of Conduct. Our staff will document infractions and follow disciplinary responses based on the consequences described in this document. 

SLIFE

Students with limited or interrupted formal education will receive individualized intervention to close the gap while advancing in their academic courses. Empower Academy will analyze each multilingual learner's profile based on the information provided during registration, as well as the data collected from an initial English proficiency screener and/or scores from content grade-level standardized assessments that will serve as benchmarks. This will allow teachers to identify areas of need and decide the next steps for RTI.

Attendance and Behavior

Students are expected to attend school daily and be on time for instruction. When a student is absent, the legal guardian must provide a written excuse to explain the absence within three days of the student's return to school. Written excuses must not exceed 10 during the school year. Further absences will require a doctor's or court official's excuse. Legal guardians and students will be referred to the Early Warning Truancy Program on the 7th unexcused absence. The parent will receive a notification by U.S. mail.

The Empower Academy program continues working during intersession and summer school. Students are expected to attend school daily during intersession and summer school, but the school hours may be different. 

The Empower Academy Program follows the Birmingham City Schools Code of Conduct. Students are expected to follow the rules stated in the Code of Conduct or they can be recommended to return to their zone school and lose the opportunity to continue participating in the Empower Academy Program. The Empower Academy staff will notify the zone school about any behavior concerns using the Student Discipline Referral form. The zone school administrator will follow up with the student's legal guardian to notify them about behavior consequences.  

Integration of Technology

Empower Academy will foster a culture of technology integration in all aspects of the students' academic life by utilizing a variety of technology in the classroom to enhance the students' academic achievement. Multilingual learners will have access to a personal device to login into the different apps to complete academic course work. Students are expected to demonstrate ethical digital citizenship, following recommendations and procedures to access the network while using a device in the school buidling.

Assessments and Benchmarks

At Empower Academy, all multilingual learners will participate in continuous formative and summative assessments, as well as in state-mandated standardized testing and benchmarks. 

Students will receive two grades per course every week, a progress report every four weeks, and a report card every nine weeks (see calendar below). The data collected from every assessment will serve to track and monitor progress to decide if a student has mastered a standard or if further intervention is needed.

All Empower Academy students will take their annual WIDA ACCESS test at their program location (Putnam Middle School or Carver High School). For all other state assessments, students will remain in their zone school to take those tests with their grade-level peers in a less restrictive environment and to ensure that a building test coordinator is supervising all test security protocols.

All multilingual learners will participate in the annual WIDA ACCESS test as a benchmark to demonstrate progress in their English proficiency. The data obtained by the WIDA ACCESS test will let the teachers know when a student is ready to move into the mainstream classroom at the end of a grading period. Multilingual learners are expected to achieve the target growth as shown in the ALSDE EL Resource Guide Section 10. 

All K-12 Multilingual Learners must participate in the ACAP for accountability purposes. However, ESSA allows the following flexibility for English Learners who have been enrolled in a U.S. school for less than 12 months:

• Exempt a recently-arrived EL from one administration of the Reading/Language Arts assessment (these students must take the math and, if applicable, the science assessments).  

• Exclude their results on the math and science assessments for the purpose of accountability (achievement). Participation in ACCESS for ELLs or Alternate ACCESS for ELLs will count towards participation.  

• Include their achievement results for all content tests in years two and beyond.

If an EL student in their first twelve months of enrollment in a U.S. school chooses to participate in the ACAP Summative or ACAP Alternate reading test, the score for that reading test will not be included for the purpose of accountability. These students will be counted as participants toward meeting the 95% participation requirement for accountability purposes.

There is no flexibility for participation in ACT assessments. All ACT assessments must be taken.

See the chart below to clarify the participation of English Learners in their first 12 months of enrollment in U.S. schools on state assessments. The EL Committee must include decisions regarding the criteria outlined below in the Individual English Language Plan (I-ELP). These decisions must be made on an individual basis. 

Choice Program

School Registration