Mary Jo Montenegro

Mary Jo Montenegro was extremely informative on the state of the Latino population in the Cincinnati Public School System. The overwhelming statistic that really set the stage for her presentation was the fact that LEP students in the district increased a whopping 250% between 2003 and 2013. That is an increase from 470 to 1895. These students speak more than 70 different languages. I was already aware of how long it takes to master a language socially and academically but the facts presented today really backed that up. The last slide that was presented was a list of cultural considerations for CPS. While they are common sense considerations, they are needed considerations that many people overlook such as don't make assumptions, value the home language and culture and create opportunities for all students to succeed. I also appreciated the common sense suggestion that to get families involved, use robo-calls that are in Spanish and don't rely strictly on letters home. While I was very impressed with the actions being taken, I was shocked that in 55 schools there are only four with ELL instructors that work directly with students and the other schools must share 3 itinerant ELL instructors especially given the fact that 46% of the students will require Intensive English supports.