ELL News Headlines

Each fall, one of the first routines I introduce is our classroom job board. It’s more than a list of tasks—it helps students feel that they belong and have real roles in our shared space. Over the years, I’ve expanded beyond classic jobs like Line Leader and Pencil Sharpener to include creative roles with quirky titles that engage and resonate with students.

Illinois lawmakers passed a new law that codifies the right of undocumented students to receive a free, public education, and requires school districts to adopt clear policies protecting students from immigration enforcement activities in schools.

The Trump administration is refusing to defend a lawsuit challenging a federal program that provides $350 million in grant funding to colleges with large populations of Hispanic students, a move that threatens the future of similar programs to help minority students.

When it was originally passed in 2001, the Texas Dream Act was intended not only to increase access to higher education for undocumented students but was also meant to bolster Texas’s economy and its workforce long-term. With that law, Texas became the first of more than two dozen states to implement in-state tuition for undocumented students, and for nearly 24 years, the landmark policy remained intact. In June, the Texas attorney general’s office and the Trump administration worked together to end the provisions in a state law that had offered thousands of undocumented students lower in-state tuition rates at Texas public colleges.

<ore than 3.6 million children born in 2020 amid the COVID-19 pandemic are walking into elementary schools across the country this fall. They're children who came into a world full of masked adults dousing themselves in hand sanitizer. Many spent the first year of their lives either in isolation in lockdowns or with only a handful of trusted people in their bubbles. And the long-term impact on these "COVID kindergartners" remains unclear.

The students of Bethune Academy reflect the larger population of their Milwaukee, WI, community: The PreK–8 school is home to a large refugee population from countries such as Myanmar and Malaysia, and many students are raised in households that speak ­Burmese, Rohingya, or Karen. Around 40 percent of the school’s students are ­English Language Learners (ELLs), which is a key factor in how they engage with the school library. 

There’s no magic formula for getting through your first year, but these pointers will help you keep perspective and carry on.

School Library Journal's starred middle and high school nonfiction offerings for the first half of 2025 are sure to keep readers engaged and informed. 

The U.S. Department of Education has quietly rescinded a seminal 2015 “Dear Colleague” letter that outlined for schools and districts how they can comply with their legal obligations to serve English learners. Advocates for English learners first became aware of the rescission the week of Aug. 11, calling it the latest effort by the federal government to weaken protections for the nation’s more than 5 million English learners.

The Trump administration has quietly rescinded long-standing guidance that directed schools to accommodate students who are learning English, alarming advocates who fear that schools will stop offering assistance if the federal government quits enforcing the laws that require it.