The Job Corps ELL standards and objectives were designed to assist teachers in moving ELLs to fluency in English, proficiency in the standards developed by Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL), and mastery of the skills and competencies identified by the Secretary’s Commission on Achieving Necessary Skills (SCANS). The ELL standards were also designed to supplement national English Language Arts (ELA) standards to ensure that ELLs develop proficiency in both the English language and the concepts and skills contained in the ELA standards. The ELL standards delineate the proficiency levels required to move through the levels of English-language development. The levels of developing proficiency in a second language have been well documented through research, and the ELL standards were designed around these levels to provide teachers in all types of programs clear benchmarks of progress.

Why Are ESL Standards Needed?

ESL standards are needed for four main reasons:

1. Job Corps centers and communities throughout the U.S. are facing increased linguistic and cultural diversity;
2. ELLs who arrive at Job Corps centers vary greatly in English proficiency level and academic background;
3. The ESL standards developed by TESOL and adapted by Berkeley Policy Associates describe the language skills necessary for social and occupational purposes; and
4. ESL standards provide a bridge to the general education standards expected of all high school students in the United States.

Using TESOL Standards to Assess Your Program

Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages is a professional organization made up of over 13,000 teachers, teachers-in-training, administrators, researchers, materials writers, and curriculum developers, in more than 120 countries. The organization’s mission is to ensure excellence in English language teaching to speakers of other languages.

The TESOL Standards Checklist (MS Word file, click to download MS Word Viewer) can assist centers with assessing how well their programs are aligned with the ESL Standards established by TESOL.

TESOL offers a five-point vision of effective education for ELLs.  In the context of the Job Corps program, this vision includes:

1. Effective academic and career technical training for ELLs includes native-like levels of proficiency in English.
2. Effective academic and career technical training for ELLs includes the maintenance and promotion of the ELLs’ native languages on center and in community contexts.
3. All instructional personnel assume responsibility for the academic and career technical training of ELLs.
4. Effective academic and career technical training also calls for comprehensive provision of first-rate services and full access to those services by all students.
5. Knowledge of more than one language and culture is advantageous for all students and staff.

The TESOL goals for English language instruction are for ESL students to be able to use English to communicate in social, academic, and vocational settings and to use English in culturally appropriate ways.  For Job Corps these translate into three key goals for ESL instruction:

Goal 1: To Use English to Communicate in Social Settings

Goal 2: To Use English to Achieve in All Academic Content Areas and Career Technical Training Programs

Goal 3: To Use English in Socially and Culturally Appropriate Ways

The English Language Learner and SCANS

The U.S. Departments of Labor and Education formed the Secretary’s Commission on Achieving Necessary Skills, which identified the technical, thinking, and social skills needed to succeed in today’s highly competitive work environment. SCANS found that the skills needed for the workplace require competency in the following areas:

• Resources
• Interpersonal (social skills)
• Information (acquiring and using information)
• Systems
• Technology

These five areas are defined in more detail as the Five SCANS Competencies

Mastery of each the five competencies depends on three sets of underlying SCANS Skills and Personal Qualities:

• Basic skills, such as reading, writing, listening, speaking, and mathematical reasoning
• Thinking skills, such as decision-making, problem solving, and creativity
• Personal qualities, such as responsibility, sociability, and self-management

Research shows that there are several considerations that instructors should keep in mind when teaching ELLs the SCANS foundation skills and competencies. First, it is important to recognize that there are two kinds of language skills, social language (e.g., face-to-face conversation on a concrete topic) and academic language, both of which are crucial to the acquisition of SCANS skills. Second, acquiring SCANS foundation skills and competencies means learning aspects of U.S. culture which may be different from the values and behaviors of a student’s home culture, but which can be important to success in a U.S. work environment.

Educators note that ELLs are a diverse group, and need different types of support in order to acquire skills outlined by SCANS. Students who have little English, but have strong academic preparation in their home countries need to develop the linguistic skills necessary to express their ideas in English. Students who have strong oral English skills may have weak or nonexistent literacy skills. The English language needs to be the tool, not the barrier, to success.

Job Corps’ staff should consider a variety of approaches to meet the needs of ELLs who are working to acquire the SCANS skills and to function competently in the workplace. Strategies to keep in mind include using the students’ native languages where possible to explain and contrast the skills required by or embodied in the competencies. SCANS competencies should be taught explicitly, so that students see them as tools that can be transferred and applied in different situations, both in English and in the student’s primary language. A wide range of materials needs to be used in the classroom. Additional strategies to keep in mind include using more performance assessments, especially those less dependent on language skills; adapting testing, (e.g. oral testing should be considered as an alternative form of assessment); and testing in the native language, where applicable.

SCANS in the Job Corps Program

ELLs must learn how to read, write, speak, listen, do mathematical operations, and demonstrate all of the SCANS skills and competencies in the context of U.S. culture, and also in the context of a specific trade.

The SCANS report What Work Requires of Schools (PDF file, click to download Adobe® Acrobat Reader) does not assume proficiency in oral English and U.S. culture, and its recommended assessment procedures do not stipulate demonstration of these competencies in English. Given the limited time that students remain in Job Corps, and the four CDSS phases through which students progress, it would benefit the student’s career development for these competencies be addressed in the primary language whenever possible. This would require bilingual/bicultural instructors and the use of alternative assessments, such as observing a student completing a task.

To assist students in developing the SCANS skills and competencies, instructors should familiarize themselves with the skills and competencies, model them, teach them explicitly, and help students to reflect on how these skills and competencies translate from one culture and language to another.

This has implications for both the content and instructional processes that instructors use. While many foundation skills are already being addressed in ESL and academic classes, they can be modeled, reinforced, and practiced in career technical classes. Similarly, while many of the competencies are already being taught in career technical classes, instructors can help students to generalize them and transfer what they already know (from previous socialization and instruction) into new contexts. The practice of reinforcing content has been used with teaching social skills in the residence programs and academic classrooms, as well as with teaching applied academics in a career technical setting. Career technical instructors can use alternative assessments and tools, such as the ESL Themes and Competencies, and the Crosswalk Between the ESL Themes and Competencies and SCANS to track progress in acquiring SCANS foundation skills and competencies.