English Language Development Academy

Campbell Union High School District

The English Language Development Academy is an innovative program developed through collaboration between our district administration, Counselors, and TOSAs. The Academy strengthens English proficiency while building community among Emergent Multilingual Learners through intensive practice in speaking, listening, reading, and writing. Our Summer Acceleration program provides newcomers with immersive English learning, focusing on academic vocabulary, oral presentations, and writing through authentic projects. During the academic year, extended day sessions offer structured conversations, academic discussions, and writing workshops aligned with ELD standards and ELPAC Task Types. Students practice English in meaningful contexts while building peer relationships. Both programs incorporate self-reflection for tracking progress across language domains. This comprehensive approach combines intensive language development with peer support, empowering students to succeed.

Program Summary

The English Language Development Academy is a strategic initiative aligning with Campbell Union High School District's LCAP goals and state priorities, serving our 8% English Multilingual student population. The program supports LCAP Goal 2, focusing on understanding and supporting emergent multilingual students, backed by district investments in smaller ELD classes and instructional aide support.

The Academy pursues four key goals:

  1. Accelerate English proficiency with targeted annual ELPI growth, increase reclassification rates beyond 33%, and support grade-level content mastery through integrated language support.

  2. Maintain or exceed the 82.8% EM student graduation rate, ensure newcomer credit accrual through summer acceleration, and prevent course failure via extended day support.

  3. Foster school community connection through bridging and extended learning activities.

  4. Track individual ELPI growth, content course progress, and program effectiveness through graduation rates, course completion, and reclassification data.

The Academy's design directly supports four key state priorities: Implementation of State Standards (Priority 2) through targeted language development, Pupil Achievement (Priority 4) via focused academic growth support, Course Access (Priority 7) ensuring curriculum accessibility, and Pupil Engagement (Priority 5) through comprehensive student support.

Program Goals

The ELD Academy shows compelling evidence of success through both district-wide achievements and detailed English Learner Progress Indicator (ELPI) growth metrics. While the district achieved remarkable improvements in graduation rates (82.8% by 2022-2023) and reclassification rates upwards of 33%, the ELPI data reveals nuanced progress across different English learner populations.

The ELPI growth data demonstrates differentiated success:

  1. Long-term English Learners (LTEL) show significant upward mobility with 60.1% of students progressing at least one ELPI level with 28% of the students progressing at least 2 levels on the ELPI.

  2. Newcomer students demonstrate strong initial progress with 57.% progressing at least one ELPI level on the summative ELPAC

Overall performance data indicates balanced progress across all levels. This distribution suggests the ELD Academy's dual-focused approach effectively supports students at all proficiency levels while maintaining consistent upward movement through the ELPI levels.

These results validate the program's comprehensive support system in promoting sustained language development across all English learner subgroups.

Impact on Students

The ELD Academy represents an innovative approach to English learner support, born from the district's dramatic transformation in EM student outcomes between 2017-2018 and 2023-2024. Facing initially low graduation rates (68.3%) and reclassification rates (7.6%), the district recognized the need for a creative solution that went beyond traditional ELD instruction.

The program's innovation lies in its dual-focused design that tackles both immediate and long-term needs. Rather than treating newcomer support and long-term English learner intervention as separate challenges, the Academy uniquely combines Summer Acceleration and extended day sessions into one comprehensive program.

Key challenges included coordinating support across multiple sites and ensuring consistent implementation. The solution was to leverage TOSAs as instructors during the pilot phase, allowing for real-time program refinement while building capacity. Another challenge was maintaining academic rigor while supporting language development. The program innovatively addressed this by aligning with grade-level standards and offering credit-earning opportunities, transforming what could have been merely supplemental support into a pathway to graduation.

The program's success is evident in its remarkable outcomes: reclassification rates quadrupled to 31.1%, graduation rates increased to 82.8%, and ELPI data shows consistent growth across all learner groups.

Innovation

The English Language Development Academy launched with strong institutional support embedded in both our district LCAP and Multilingual Learner Masterplan, ensuring long-term commitment and funding stability. The program's infrastructure is built on three key pillars of sustainability: Financial sustainability, staffing infrastructure, and stakeholder support.

The program is funded through a combination of LCAP and Title III allocations, with dedicated budget lines that recognize this as an essential service for our Emergent Multilingual students. This diversified funding approach protects the program from single-source budget fluctuations.

Our TOSAs (Teachers on Special Assignment) serve as both curriculum developers and instructors, creating a sustainable model of expertise and program delivery. They've developed comprehensive curriculum materials and assessment tools that can be easily shared with future instructors as the program expands.

The program has garnered strong support across our educational community. Parents consistently report high satisfaction through our feedback, while students demonstrate strong attendance rates and academic growth.

The program's integration into our district's core services, rather than as a temporary intervention, demonstrates our long-term commitment to supporting Emergent Multilingual Learners. Regular data collection and program evaluation processes ensure continuous improvement and responsiveness to student needs.

Sustainability

Replicability

The English Language Development Academy is designed with replication in mind, utilizing a well-documented and scalable model that any district can implement with reasonable resources. The program has already proven its replicability across all our comprehensive and alternative sites. Each location successfully runs the extended day sessions and our summer sessions have grown while maintaining program fidelity through our standardized yet flexible framework.

The program is intentionally structured to be cost-efficient. It leverages existing TOSA positions and site staff and utilizes standard classroom spaces. Our program builds on existing assessment and monitoring systems and requires minimal specialized materials.

We've created a digital resource hub containing all program materials and implementation guides. This centralized repository makes it easy for new teachers to access resources and begin implementation.

Supporting Data & Info

Video of Program