Tahoma School District and the State of Washington!

Cause Effect Effect

Law: ELL students must be given Policy: In the tahoma district,
fair opportunity in a classroom students of elementary years are
setting with the freedom to learn in a normal class room but pulled
out 3 days of the week. In middle
school they spend 3 of the 6
class periods in ELL classes
Implication: This is based off
their english proficiency on a
need to need basis. Therefore
students are still involved with Ell
students and vice versa.

Law:certified ELL instructor! Policy: there should be trained Implication: the teacher should
!! staff in order to communicate
with the students and further
be able to fully support,and
further the childs experience and
their knowledge of english knowledge
learning

Law: Literacy in native language
deciphers where they start if no
previous education was provided
before attending!
!!
Policy: district staff interviewed
note that the deciding factor
regarding the amount of !
supplemental assistance that
ELL students need is literacy in
their native language.
Implication: if a student has not
had a previous education they
decide their proficiency level
based off their literacy in their
native language

!
!
! To obtain my information I had to do a mixture between the state of Washington, as well
as the Tahoma School district. If I would have known before starting this class how little
information tahoma shared about their ELL program, I would not have decided that as my
school district. I obtained my information however from the Tahoma school budget, k12 articles,
and then from the tahoma school district ELL page. While researching the first thing I did was
look up the tahoma budget. Throughout this course I have found myself struggling to find
information, and I think I now know why. After scrolling through the 34 page processed receipt of
the tahoma school district budget, examining it multiple times, there was not an ELL budget
obviously listed. That is when I further investigated and realized it was budgeted under the
same category as special education. Tahoma although is known for being a strong academic
school seems to put the ELL programs in the back of their minds overall weakening their
program. So when I tried to research the rules and standards of their program, of course they
were no where to be found. I think it was interesting how in the reading the no child left behind
act was said to be a non effective way of holding schools accountable for ELLs (Pg. 56).
Although I feel like it is not fair that standardized testing should be the ultimate decider of school
funding, I think it does help the schools that are not as passionate and supportive of their ELL
programs. This being said, a school like tahoma which does not have as many ELL students are
still being held accountable to make sure that they are fully being supported within the districts
and all their needs are being met. !