Deering High School Students Mobilize Within Their Networks

Stage One: During the Fall of 2016, four former ELL students—all self-identifying women—decided to initiate meetings with their school administration about their equity concerns with the ACCESS Test and ELL classroom reform. 

Stage Two: In this meeting, they expressed their concerns and urged the administration to join their effort and/or present their concerns to higher-level officials.

Stage Three: The students aimed to maximize their efforts, so they returned to the Seeds of Peace organization since they were already members. Here, they were able to present their case to other students and gain more traction and support. This specific strategy was crucial because they recognized that their cause would only transgress beyond Deering High School if they came in larger numbers. Aside from numbers, people act as resources in social mobilizations—offering vast networks and connections to the group. 

Outcome: Their movement grew from four students to almost thirty students spanning across three different public schools: Derring, Portland, and Casco Bay High School.

Their Proposition: After holding a series of meetings, the group of students came up with a few different approaches to the issue at hand. One of these strategies was to administer the ACCESS test to all students instead of students who were deemed English-deficient through a problematic and biased process.

The Results: When the test was administered, it was shown that white students fared just as badly as FGLI students who spoke a second language. 

Youth Leaders Give Voice to Parents 

As a former ELL student herself, Mariana Angelo knew the prevalence of the system’s inequities and was determined to advocate for current ELL students. She was very well-connected to her community, particularly the African-immigrant community in the greater Portland area, so she set out to inform parents about what was happening at these public schools with their children in ELL classrooms.

What did she do? 

Mariana started holding community meetings at her neighborhood communal center and even began door-knocking around her neighborhood (which was primarily made up of African immigrants).

She encouraged parents to go to their child’s school and speak to the administration with interpreters and ask about their child’s time in the ELL classroom. She essentially wanted the parents to advocate for their children, so the administration was aware that they were no longer going to allow the system to relentlessly confine them to the ELL classroom.

What was the outcome? 

Eventually, a wave of immigrant parents began going to their children’s schools and demanding information regarding their child and their ELL experience. This lit a fire under these schools’ administrations because they were now being confronted with the fact that parents were outraged with how they were attempting to educate their children.

This allowed parents to reclaim a sense of agency and feel empowered enough to confront these issues impacting their children, who often could not advocate for themselves.