BATON ROUGE - The Louisiana Department of Education announced Tuesday its release of tools to help English Learners during the adjusted forms of instruction utilized in Louisiana schools amid the novel coronavirus pandemic.

The tools are found in LDOE's Strong Start 2020: Guidance to Support English Learners, which was designed to help school systems ensure English Learners (ELs) have equitable access to high-quality instruction across virtual, hybrid and traditional learning scenarios.

Throughout the summer, the LDOE has regularly updated a suite of resources to help ensure a strong start to the school year.

The Department's latest resource will help schools serve students who speak a language other than English. 

"Every child deserves access to a quality education," said State Superintendent of Education Dr. Cade Brumley. "The pandemic created additional challenges in how we serve our English Learners, and these resources will provide guidance and support to our educators as they serve children and their families."

The Department developed this resource alongside teachers, system leaders and stakeholder organizations. It will prompt a high bar of excellence for educators and students. 

Some of the guidance includes:

-Identifying newly enrolled English Learners

-Communicating with families

-Preparing for supporting English Learner instruction

-Delivering supportive English Learner instruction in multiple settings

-Providing English Learner accommodations

-Frequently asked questions 

English Learners come from diverse backgrounds, both culturally and linguistically. They bring to their learning a vast set of experiences and knowledge-base as they engage in the learning process in a new language. Louisiana believes ELs, like all other students, can achieve academic success through a clear and concise alignment of quality standards, instructional programs and resources, professional development and assessments. ELs comprise approximately 4 percent of all public school students in Louisiana. 

EL supervisors across the state are coming together for the LDOE's EL Community of Practice virtual series. This series places school systems into cohorts based on the size of their EL population and gives them an opportunity to discuss best practices and areas of concerns all while receiving guidance from the Department on a specific topic. This month's focus area was on using the EL Coach to support ELs across all learning scenarios.

The Department has created a library of resources to support ELs. Questions and concerns can be sent to alice.garcia@la.gov.