November 21, 2023
Board of Education
Tooele County School District
Members of the Board,
We write to you as concerned parents, employees, and community members to voice our firm opposition to the district’s plan to phase out the Chinese, German, and Russian Dual Language Immersion programs.
We oppose this decision for a multitude of reasons, which are detailed in the appendix accompanying this letter. We urge you to read it in its entirety and give each point the careful consideration it deserves.
We believe these programs constitute an immeasurable asset in the lives of not only our children, but our community and our nation. Chinese and German are widely considered two of the most valuable languages for career success. Chinese and Russian are of critical importance for national defense — in fact, China and Russia are the only two countries explicitly mentioned in the 2022 National Defense Strategy top priorities. Additionally, research consistently underscores the cognitive, social, and cultural benefits afforded to children enrolled in DLI programs. The opportunities provided to our children by these three language programs are undeniable.
We respectfully request that you reverse this decision and commit to ensuring the continuation of the Chinese, German, and Russian DLI programs. We understand your position requires you to make difficult choices that will best serve our district. In this instance, we believe moving ahead with this plan is the wrong decision and will cause irreparable harm.
We understand a successful DLI program is not without significant challenges, but we believe it is worth every effort. We ask that the district and board members work closely with us, the stakeholders, to identify alternative solutions and overcome those challenges. We are ready and willing to work with you. Our children — our future — deserve nothing less.
Thank you for your attention to this matter.
The DLI Stakeholders
Enclosures: 2
Enclosure A: A Rebuttal to the TCSD’s DLI Redesign
November 21, 2023
Foreword
We, the stakeholders of the Tooele County School District (TCSD) Dual Language Immersion (DLI) program, fervently oppose the district’s plans to phase out the Chinese, German, and Russian programs. We call on the District and the School Board to overturn this decision.
We are a coalition of parents, students, family, and friends. We are employees and educators. We are neighbors, coworkers, and members of the community. We stand united in our efforts to ensure our children are afforded the very best opportunities — we consider the continuation of the Chinese, German, and Russian programs critical in that regard.
We have thoroughly reviewed the district’s plans to end the Chinese, German, and Russian programs, including archives of previous board meetings, presentations, and proposals. We maintain several of the key assumptions on which the plans were formed are fundamentally flawed. Furthermore, we have identified other areas of concern we feel were not adequately addressed in the district’s research or deliberation.
We do not wish to raise complaints without also providing possible solutions. To that end, we have included a range of proposals and courses of action. We urge the district to collaborate with us to identify, analyze, resource, and execute the course of action most likely to secure our children’s best interests.
This document was a collaborative effort and represents a broad range of opinions, backgrounds, and interests. The stakeholders involved in the preparation of this document are available for contact, should the District wish to explore a particular point in greater detail. We urge the District to do so. A list of individuals who have volunteered to serve as interlocutors is listed at the end of this document.
Key Facts
We consider the following to be key facts on which the District’s plan was prepared and presented. These are derived from District and Board presentations, records of meetings, and discussions with District leaders and Board members.
On November 14th, 2023 the Tooele County School Board announced the District’s decision to phase out Chinese, German, and Russian DLI over a 12 year period. The plan is scheduled to take effect in January 2024 with the end of 1st grade enrollment in DLI for the aforementioned languages.
The District’s plan, as presented by the Executive Director for Teaching & Learning, Dr. Cody Reutzel, aims to have 60 students per DLI cohort at each school.
The District’s plan cites attrition and smaller class sizes as a primary motivator for the decision.
The District’s plan cites resource constraints and inequitable distribution of resources as a primary motivator for the decision.
The District’s plan calls for establishment of additional Spanish DLI classes beyond what are currently offered.
The District’s plan commits to retain any and all DLI qualified teachers whose language will be gone after the phase out period.
The District has repeatedly stated implementation of the plan will not directly affect any current DLI students.
During the November 14th meeting, the Board questioned Corley Ward, Curriculum Director for Accelerated Programs, Dual Language Immersion, Social Studies, and World Languages, what efforts had been made to increase enrollment in the District’s DLI programs. His response consisted of:
Demonstration lessons for kindergartners
Communications through Peach Jar
A tab on the District’s website
Secretaries making phone calls
Signs
Key Assumptions
We consider the following to be key assumptions on which the District’s plan was prepared and presented:
60 students per DLI cohort at each school is the ideal number for a successful DLI program, and will effectively mitigate losses due to attrition.
Attrition is, for the most part, natural and inevitable.
The numbers presented, particularly with regard to enrollment, attrition, resource expenditures, and grades are accurate and sound.
An equitable distribution of resources requires the costs per DLI student and traditional students should be roughly equal.
Additional Spanish classes will ensure “supply” of DLI will meet community “demand”.
The District’s plan will result in a more efficient utilization of resources.
DLI teachers will, for the most part, elect to continue teaching in their respective languages until the end of the phase out period, after which the District will retain them to teach other subjects as long as they’re qualified to do so.
There will be sufficient DLI teachers to continue teaching all existing cohorts of Chinese, German, and Russian until completion of the 12 year phase out period.
If the number of teachers who choose to leave exceeds the number of positions being eliminated, the District will be able to fill those openings with short-term international guest teachers.
The District’s plan will not directly affect the mental, social, emotional wellbeing of any current DLI students.
The District pursued every reasonable effort to increase enrollment before proceeding with the plan to remove languages.
Issues, Concerns, and Questions
After careful consideration of all available data, records, presentations, and plans, we are raising the following issues, concerns, and questions:
Based on Dr. Reutzel’s presentation, the District aims to have 60 students enrolled per cohort at each school, with two teachers per cohort. That equates to a student to teacher ratio of 30:1.
How was that number determined?
We believe this “one size fits all” approach is not feasible according to the dynamics present in each school.
What is preventing that number from being tailored to individual languages based on demand/enrollment instead of a “one size fits all” approach?
Utah leads the nation in crowded classrooms, with an average of 26.6 students per class. Studies have shown optimal learning occurs in classes with fewer than 20 students. We understand there needs to be a balance between ideal and reality, but declaring a goal that far exceeds the current highest student to teacher ratio in the nation (our own) is ill-conceived.
28 states (56%) have laws that limit class size. The average limit is 23, with the average recommended size at 19. This proposal breaks with commonly accepted practices, to the detriment of our children and employees.
Utah enacted UTAH CODE ANN. § 53A -17a-124.5 to incentivize districts to reduce class sizes by providing additional funding allocation for teachers. We do not need to cancel programs and repurpose former DLI teachers. We can get allocation for new traditional teachers. We should NEVER be pushing for 30, in DLI or traditional.
Attrition is certainly a concern, but we question how the data was collected, interpreted, and presented.
The presentation on November 14th showed average attrition by school. Conspicuously absent was data showing attrition over time. We believe covid may have had a significant impact on attrition rates.
What are the main causes of attrition? (People moving, parents choosing to homeschool, students dropping out of DLI, etc)
What are the attrition numbers by cause, and are any able to be mitigated before the student withdraws? How much is due to people moving, parents choosing to homeschool, students dropping out of DLI, etc.
How does the DLI attrition rate compare with overall attrition rate seen at each school?
We recognize that a healthy stream of enrollment is critical for sustaining a successful DLI program. However, we feel the District and the Board did not adequately attempt to address enrollment concerns prior to announcing their intent to move forward with the plan.
In previous School Board meetings, readjusting school boundaries was stated to be a top priority with regards to boosting DLI enrollment. A plan was supposed to be submitted by April 2023. Based on conversations with Board members, we have learned the administration decided to delay boundary decisions to coincide with the new high school in 2025. By postponing this decision until after three languages are removed, it will remove a major component of what the Board and District were supposed to do to increase enrollment at these three schools, thus simplifying boundary decisions but to the detriment of the existing DLI programs.
We feel the District was not fully invested in supporting our schools’ efforts to boost DLI enrollment. We recognize the District provided resources for individual schools, but it seems the District did not actively and deliberately promote DLI besides updating a DLI tab on their website homepage.
We believe adequate time was not provided for efforts to increase enrollment to bear fruit. (For example: a town hall was held in September of 2023 to collaborate on ideas for how to increase enrollment, yet the District announced this plan a mere two months later.)
Demonstration classes for children are good, but the parents are the ones who ultimately determine whether or not a child is enrolled in DLI. We believe more direct, timely, and repeated engagement with the parents will result in increased enrollment.
We believe a more deliberate and consistent campaign involving local and state media will be beneficial. (For example: everyone knows what Coke is, yet they consistently advertise. It’s important to cultivate a widespread, positive, and inviting image.)
We believe more recognition by national and international organizations could add prestige to the DLI program and entice more parents to enroll their children. The District should actively seek to partner with worthy and reputable organizations to recognize and reward our DLI students for their efforts. Additionally, greater association with such organizations could lead to additional opportunities for our children down the road. (Scholarships, internships, employment, cultural exchanges, etc.)
The development of scholarships for DLI program graduates could incentivize students to stick with the program, thus helping to mitigate attrition as children progress towards graduation.
Expanded cultural events could serve as low threat opportunities for non-DLI families to be exposed to the program. (Northlake’s Chinese New Year celebration and West’s Christmas Market are well attended and beloved by the community.)
Partnering with local real estate agents to educate incoming buyers about DLI opportunities could result in increased enrollment.
We understand the District is working with limited resources and has a responsibility to ensure all funds are utilized appropriately. However, we believe there are some flaws with how the District’s plan assessed resource requirements, expenditures, and returns on investment.
Reducing FTE for smaller DLI programs would be the most effective way to balance these programs, and could be accomplished with coordination with schools and teachers to develop a strategy and parameters for implementation that would be most beneficial to all students.
Has the district explored options to secure additional funding from state, federal, or private entities? Considering Chinese and Russian are languages critical to the most recent US National Defense Strategy, we believe it is in the best interest of both the District and our nation to pursue additional funding arrangements.
Has the District developed relationships with other DLI programs across the country to share best practices, information on resource acquisition and utilization, and lessons learned?
What additional resources have been requested to facilitate all languages currently taught?
Are the District’s statistics on cost per student for DLI and traditional accurate? (For example, some DLI teachers are covering multiple grades. Was that factored into the cost per student?)
This plan places a terrible and unjust burden on our Chinese, German, and Russian teachers.
Though the District committed to hire all qualified DLI teachers whose positions are eventually eliminated by the plan, this is of little consolation to teachers who joined our community specifically to teach their languages. This course of action requires them to retool and acquire qualifications for an unanticipated and unfamiliar skill set, requiring considerable sacrifices of both time and money. As far as we have seen, the District has not committed to finance this mandated professional transition for our teachers.
Some teachers will, understandably, elect not to transition to a new subject and will feel compelled to seek employment elsewhere. This will undoubtedly be a cause of significant mental and emotional strain, as they may feel they are abandoning their students by leaving for more suitable employment prospects — not to mention hardship for the students as their teachers depart the community.
We believe the District may be misjudging the extent to which it will lose teachers as they exit our community prior to the completion of this plan. We also believe the District’s intention to fill those gaps, should they arise, with short-term international guest teachers is risky.
We lament that the District did not involve us more fully in the development and analysis of this plan. The lack of consistent, sincere, and transparent engagement has left many feeling disenfranchised and betrayed.
In communication with District leadership, we were told the District decided to proceed with this plan after consulting with “an extensive list” of community members. We desire to know who was consulted? What was the criteria for determining who would be solicited for input?
We have requested a copy of this “extensive list” of community members, but have yet to receive any response.
Some of us were consulted, but feel the discussion was not a genuine effort to solicit our input for a course of action. Also, some feel the premises on which the discussion took place were disingenuous or misinformed. (For example: it appears that when the District referred to “DLI”, it meant whatever languages they would eventually decide to keep; whereas those who were asked to provide feedback and suggestions for improvement understood “DLI” to mean all six languages, and provided their feedback believing an effort would be made to keep them all.)
From when this plan was initially proposed until when the decision was announced on November 14th, both the District and the Board gave us multiple commitments. We feel several were not seriously pursued — or worse — entirely broken.
In September 2022, the Board meeting resulted in a commitment to look at West Elementary and the surrounding boundaries in an effort to realign and boost DLI enrollment. We were told this was the Board’s number one priority, however, a decision on West has still not been made and the boundary plan was postponed until after the elimination of these languages.
The Board committed to convene a stakeholder committee in order to provide ideas to help DLI programs. Considering the minimal evidence available that this was accomplished in an effective manner, one has to ask if this was even done.
The Board expressed that sufficient time should be allowed to see what effects those efforts had on DLI programs. One summer's effort from the schools with no additional promotion by the district does not adequately provide that sufficient time.
Minutes from an August 2022 Board meeting read “Mr. Reutzel stated that the District would commit to a deliberate process, seek feedback from stakeholders, and take a staged approach to action; if we cut languages, we would cut one at a time. We would, by December of 2022, determine the overall vision and staging; by February 2023, finalize changes for the 23-24 school year; and have a review meeting in January 2024.” Clearly, these commitments were not honored.
We wish to know exactly how this plan was selected and how it was weighed against alternative courses of action.
The District failed to give adequate consideration for hardships this plan will impose on DLI families.
Many of us have children currently enrolled in the program and were planning on enrolling their younger siblings when of eligible age. This has caused considerable emotional strain for our younger children who were eagerly awaiting their chance to join the program.
Several of us deliberately chose to move our families to this community based on the Chinese, German, and Russian language programs. We have made personal, social, financial, and professional sacrifices to ensure our children would be able to experience these opportunities. We feel the District does not fully appreciate the severity of the damage this would cause towards these families. Many are considering moving elsewhere. For those who stay, continuing with this plan to end Chinese, German, and Russian will result in lasting and deep seated mistrust towards the District and the Board.
Many families have made long-term educational plans based on the availability of Chinese, German, and Russian in the District’s DLI plan. Was this considered in the decision making process?
How many families have children attending school outside of their boundaries in order to attend a DLI program? The District’s plan as presented makes no mention of these, and we believe they would be insightful.
Was consideration given to changing the location of certain languages? Demand for a particular language likely varies based on a given community. Further, limited access to facilities with languages of interest to said communities could be hurting enrollment.
We believe the District’s decision to end Chinese, German, and Russian is shortsighted and robs our children of immeasurably valuable skill sets. In previous District and Board presentations, we have repeatedly been told how valuable these three languages are.
Recommendations & Proposals
Establish a program to utilize UTA vans to transport smaller cohorts from one boundary to another without the need for buses. This provides additional opportunities for families where transportation is a barrier to DLI selection.
Establish a medium for DLI families to connect with one another to facilitate a carpool system, thus easing the burden on the District and community of DLI families.
Consider consolidating German and Russian into one school and making the other school English only. Settlement Canyon and Copper Canyon are significant feeder schools to the other DLI programs.
The District should deliberately and diligently coordinate an effort to promote DLI and its benefits with the local community through advertising, working with real estate agents, preschools, daycares, etc.
Work with schools to create updated FTE plans for smaller DLI programs to free up space if/when traditional classes become overwhelmed.
Commit to reestablishing boundaries for West Elementary, realigning surrounding boundaries, and building a new school at West.
Establish a timeline for review of proposed DLI changes AFTER all feasible avenues have been implemented.
Establish scholarships to incentivize DLI students to remain in the program until completion.
Consider using DLI teachers who are qualified to teach more robust traditional classes more effectively. Have traveling teachers to reduce attrition because of parent/student travel fatigue.
Seek more autonomy from the state to run our programs in secondary schools.
Allow adequate time for efforts to increase enrollment to bear fruit.
Implement a more direct, timely, and repeated engagement campaign with parents — particularly parents of kindergartners — to advertise DLI and encourage enrollment.
We believe more recognition by national and international organizations could add prestige to the DLI program and entice more parents to enroll their children. The District should actively seek to partner with worthy and reputable organizations to recognize and reward our DLI students for their efforts. Additionally, greater association with such organizations could lead to additional opportunities for our children down the road. (Scholarships, internships, employment, cultural exchanges, etc.)
Continue and expand cultural events to serve as low threat opportunities for non-DLI families to be exposed to the program. (For example: Northlake’s Chinese New Year and West’s Christmas Market)
Conclusion
To lose these language programs would be a tragedy; but to lose them due to a misguided and hastily implemented plan would be unforgivable. We are confident there is more than sufficient cause for the District to reverse course and reevaluate. We demand the District unambiguously halt implementation of this plan and commit to work with us on developing a better way ahead.
We recognize there are significant hurdles facing the DLI program as a whole, but we are positive these obstacles are not insurmountable — so long as we work together. We urge the District and the Board to engage in genuine dialogue with us on how we might build a better future for our children and our community.
Should the District and the Board refuse to engage with us on this matter and proceed anyway, we will consider the members of both to be wholly unfit for office. In that case, we will do everything in our power to see them voted out and replaced with individuals more willing and able to represent our will as constituents.