Last week, the National Committee for Effective Literacy (NCEL) held its inaugural literacy summit, bringing together educators, researchers, and advocates from across the United States to discuss all aspects of creating a literacy system that is inclusive of all students, and embraces multilingualism. This all day summit comes just months after California signed into law, AB 1454, a new literacy policy that recognizes the importance of a comprehensive approach toward teaching students to read and write.
Throughout the day, presenters shared their experience teaching literacy to diverse students. From embracing the cultural and linguistic gifts students bring to school each day, including indigenous students in San Diego, to sharing best in class practices for assessing and educating multilingual learners, nearly 500 attendees got to witness dedicated professionals articulate a vision for a literacy system that reflects the diversity of our nation’s youth.
As former United States Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona, Dr. Nell Duke, Amelia Larson, and Dr. Jody Slavick underscored in their closing panel “multilingual learners cannot be an asterisk in the nation’s literacy agenda”. For years, states have adopted literacy policies that emphasize the importance of foundational skills at the expense of a more comprehensive approach. NCEL has worked hard to elevate the importance of oral language, vocabulary, background knowledge, and comprehension. We know these factors are crucial for ensuring students learn to love reading. These are elements of literacy that cannot be ignored if we want to support our nation’s multilingual learners. Ignoring their needs is a detriment to our entire education system.
NCEL brought together leaders in policy and practice to send a clear message that improving literacy for multilingual learners can no longer be viewed as a “nice to have”. We are grateful to presenters for shining a light on local, state, and national policies and practices that advance literacy education worthy of our brilliant multilingual learners.
We are also grateful to Dr. Laurie Olsen for highlighting that our community must work together to create safe and inclusive environments that embrace students’ cultures and home languages. It is going to take families, communities, and policymakers from every corner of the United States to ensure that all students can benefit from literacy practices that recognize the gifts of a multilingual and multicultural world.
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