Uncertain Time for Immigrants’ Children in School - November 01, 2024

0:02On the first day of seventh grade in Aurora, Colorado, this past August, Alison Ramirez worried about making friends and not understanding lessons taught in English. I was nervous that people would ask me things and I wouldn't know how to answer, the Venezuelan teen says, and I would be ashamed to answer in Spanish. But it was not what she had expected. Teachers had translated words from their lessons into Spanish. They gave out written instructions in Spanish. Some teachers even asked in Spanish if students had finished or had questions. That made me feel better, says Allison. The 13-year-old is among the 3,000 new students, mostly from Venezuela and Colombia, at the Aurora Public School System.

1:09While teachers have been working hard to educate children of immigrants, outside the classrooms city officials are not as welcoming. They promised not to spend any money helping newcomers and tried to keep them from coming to the area. One city official even claimed that criminals from Venezuela had occupied buildings in Aurora. The police investigated and found it was not true, but the false claim continued to spread. Maria Angel Torres is Allison's mother. The family had left Venezuela to escape lawlessness and violence. They left behind a food truck business after being attacked for not paying protection money. The family then crossed the dangerous Darien Gap on foot to head north and seek asylum

2:16in the United States. Torres said she did not believe criminals had taken over buildings. But she worried that bad reports about Venezuelans would affect her and her family. Some organizations and churches wanted to help her family, but others are deeply afraid. Torres told the Associated Press, I don't look like a threat, but people here act like they feel terrorized. Aurora is used to educating children of immigrants. The 2020 census reported that more than a third of people in Aurora speak a language other than English at home. Immigrants and refugees have been moving to Aurora because it is close to Denver and it has a lower cost of living. However, some schools in the area were not ready for the sudden arrival of many non-English

3:24speaking students from Venezuela and Colombia. Before, a teacher might have had one or two new students in her class. Now, teachers in some schools have as many as ten, or a third of their classroom. Marcela Garcia is the head of Aurora Hills Middle School. She observed that some new students were not talking in classrooms where only English was spoken. So, the school system advised teachers to use a method called translanguaging. That means using Spanish or the home language at times to help new students understand English lessons and discussions happening around them. The method has helped Allison feel more at ease. One day in September, Allison and her friends spoke Spanish among themselves as their teacher

4:35spoke to the class in English about a drawing he was showing in front of the class. It was a drawing of an ancient Egyptian marketplace. �What do you think this dude here is doing with the basket?� the teacher asked the One girl who had been in Aurora schools longer than the rest translated for Allison and the other new students. Before the school began using this new method, teachers may have stopped the new students from talking among themselves. Now they permit students to help each other in any language they can. So far there appears to be little public criticism in the area against this method. It generally requires more work for teachers, who have to translate materials or their talks in real time.

5:36Recently, Allison's mother received messages from Aurora Public Schools that there have been rumors of bomb threats at its schools and others across the state. The schools said there was no truth to the rumors, but that does not make Torres feel better. In Venezuela, the country is in trouble, but no one there would think of threatening children at school. I'm Jill Robbins.