For the past few years Maria Dejesus Thompson has been advocating for a better English development program at the Sweetwater Union High School District.
The English development teacher at Bonita Vista High School has wanted the district to provide English learners with the proper curriculum, classes and treatment in order to succeed in learning the language in and out of the classroom.
But she said district officials continually ignore calls for an improved system.
“When we have raised issues, they have not really taken into consideration what we deemed important or validated what we’ve been saying for years,” Dejesus Thompson said.
Some of those issues have included the misplacement of English language students. She said students who are newcomers to this country are often placed in English development courses that don’t suit them. Thompson also said schools are advancing non-English speaking students too rapidly or they are taken out of the program too soon
Now in an effort to bring a better program to non-English speaking students, Dejesus Thompson and others formed the South Bay Community Bilingual Taskforce, a group compromised of teachers, parents, students and community members.
“What we are about is to get away from this marginalization of English learners,” she said. “We want an equal opportunity for these English learners. Equal access is what they’re supposed to have.”
Sweetwater board President Frank Tarantino said he doesn’t have any knowledge about the taskforce, nor is he aware of their concerns about the district’s English development program.
“I feel that we do a very good job in serving our English language learners,” Tarantino said.
Tarantino said he would like to meet the taskforce to hear about any of their concerns. He also said if they want to improve the programs they should work jointly with the district.
The teacher’s union, the Sweetwater Education Association, had its own taskforce but Thompson and other English development teachers had to adhere to their rules.
So the recently created taskforce separated from the Sweetwater Education Association and formed on its own, to seek public input from all stakeholders, which Thompson said the union’s bylaws prohibited. Only teachers were allowed in the SEA taskforce.
The South Bay Community Bilingual Taskforce wanted input from the public, not just teachers.
“We were formed out of the need to be more inclusive,” she said. “We tried to work with the district under the guidelines of SEA but we haven’t had that much success.”
Sweetwater Education Association President Roberto Rodriguez said the teacher’s union taskforce is “an internal committee.”
Rodriguez agreed that the English Development program could be improved.
“I think it’s a program that’s been in decline for a long time,” he said.
Rodriguez said he isn’t exactly sure what areas of the bilingual education programs need to be improved.
Rodriguez said the taskforce does not affect the teachers’ membership with the union.
Rodriguez said if the taskforce organizes correctly then it could have some influence with changes being made.
The South Bay Community Bilingual Taskforce focuses on curriculum for non-English speaking students and political issues that may pertain to them in the district.
