The No Child Left Behind

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advantaged and disadvantaged students. The United States Census Bureau shows that the nation’s Latino population grew by 1.4 million in 2007 to reach 45.5 million people, or 15.1% of the total U.S. population of 301.6 million affirming that Hispanics continue to be the largest minority group and the fastest-growing group.

In this context, school leaders are also facing such challenges. The above are worthy goals because they require extraordinary improvement in students’ learning. However, the challenges for ELL students are especially difficult, involving both educational and technical issues. The premise is that standardized tests are difficult for ELL students. They believe that most of ELL students try harder academically than their non-ELL student’s counterparts and put extraordinary effort into trying to do their best in high-stakes standardized assessments. ELL students who work hard, if not even harder, yet they are far behind so it is a challenge for them to keep up to the standards the state has set. Along these lines ELL children work harder because they know there is a language barrier to overcome.

Recommendation

In order for the community to function properly, it is in need of an effective educational environment; the leadership must play an important role in bringing together the diversity that exists in these schools. In this regard, it is recommended that continued cultural proficiency training coupled with specific subject area training be made available to the staff. In this regard, if school leaders and teachers see the value of cultural diversity, they may realize and create ways to build bridges for their students. Therefore, in order to encourage the value of diversity, ADELANTE needs to develop a stronger relationship with Toledo Public Schools and Catholic Diocese, the hope will be to strengthen a sense of diversity within a school community by valuing the differences, which are manifest in students’ lives and to use those differences as the basis for school teaching-learning process. This should be explored and researched if it is to impact culture and language barriers.

Also recommended is that those in the leadership roles practice specific to the improvement of achievement for ELL students and their families in the community. Further studies need to look into whether and how cultural differences are rooted in primary schools that may contribute towards secondary school performance. Ethnic differences may bring about cultural differences in terms of language, practices, rituals, attitudes, values, beliefs, and perceptions. Perhaps these factors give rise to equally diverse ways of teaching and learning and consequently might result in differences in level of achievement.