Federal officials visit Austin to discuss mentors, bilingual education at SXSW EDU

Partnerships and community supports were central themes on a U.S. Department of Education visit to Austin district schools Tuesday.

Federal officials reviewed programs supported through COVID-19 relief dollars in a visit to Austin as part of a tour of similar projects at schools nationwide.

The national leaders were in town to participate in SXSW EDU, an education-focused portion of South by Southwest that ran Monday through Thursday.

During a Tuesday roundtable at Govalle Elementary School, 3601 Govalle Ave., district staff members spoke with national leaders about the National Partnership for Student Success, an effort that began in 2022 to recruit more tutors and mentors to aid in pandemic recovery.

It’s important to have a group of people at the school supporting students, said Sharon Vigil, CEO of Communities in Schools of Central Texas. The nonprofit provides mentorship and other supports for students at 103 campuses across the region.

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“Students feel loved and cared for and are able to talk about what’s going on in here so that doesn’t block their learning,” Vigil said.

That support has been especially important post-pandemic, when students experienced serious disruption, she said.

Giving people a safe environment to ask for help is key to building the kind of community students need, said Cindy Marten, the U.S. deputy secretary of education.

“You get real help and real solutions from a loving, caring group of people who just want to help you live your best life,” Marten said.

Mentor programs that build a sense of safety are critical to improving student learning and reducing chronic absenteeism, which became an issue for schools nationwide during the pandemic, she said.

Bilingual education

Federal education officials also toured Widén Elementary School’s bilingual education programs in Dove Springs.

A prekindergarten class sang self-introductions and a “get well soon” rhyme for an absent classmate in Spanish. Fifth graders analyzed a Spanish poem about peace, stanza by stanza.

Just over half of Widén’s student body is emergent bilingual, meaning their families speak a language other than English at home. A slightly higher percentage of students are registered in a dual enrollment program, Principal Benito Faz-Banda Jr. said.

The Austin district created a bilingual educators' roundtable and reaches out to parents to advocate for support for formal education in second languages, Superintendent Matias Segura said during the discussion Tuesday.

Dialogue with immigrant communities is necessary to change generational perspectives on heritage languages, said Montserrat Garibay, assistant deputy secretary over the federal department's Office of English Language Acquisition. Garibay is a product of Austin district schools and former district bilingual pre-K teacher.

As a teacher, Garibay heard from parents who saw English as a language taught at school and Spanish as a language taught at home.

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Shifting parents' views has required an emphasis on the value of formalized Spanish language education and acknowledgement that learning Spanish won't damage a student's English language skills, Garibay said.

President Joe Biden's Raise the Bar initiative lists multilingualism as a tenant of social equity and economic global competitiveness.

Programs such as the one at Widén were funded through pandemic-era federal investment in education, but as the money runs out, districts will have to decide locally how and whether to continue those efforts, Marten said.

"Now you're going to have a sustainability conversation," Marten said. "Let's keep funding the things that we found have worked."

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Federal education officials visit Austin schools during SXSW EDU 2024