College requests state help for ESOL crush

Wednesday, Feb. 22, 2006

A tidal wave of immigrants who want to learn English is overwhelming the capacity of Montgomery College to respond to their needs.

The college’s adult education classes serve 18,000 people a year, 82 percent of whom are seeking English language instruction. The waiting list for classes is about 800 people, a number that is expected to grow as the college completes spring semester registration.

County officials are turning to the Maryland General Assembly for help. A report released in December called for Maryland to spend $26.5 million to expand adult education over the next four to five years, including $5 million for the first year. Three Montgomery lawmakers have introduced bills in response.

The report said Maryland spent $77 for each adult education student in fiscal 2003, while 16 East Coast states and the District of Columbia together averaged $477 per student. Only Rhode Island ranked below Maryland among East Coast states.

‘‘This will make us mediocre. It would move us up from abysmal,” said County Councilman Thomas E. Perez (D-Dist. 5) of Takoma Park, who served on the state panel that wrote the report. ‘‘There are people who say this isn’t the time. I’d say, ‘You’re right, we should’ve done this 10 years ago.’”

The college took over adult education from the county school system a year ago, offering classes in English, literacy and a general equivalency diploma program at 16 sites around the county.

‘‘The waiting list is very long,” said George M. Payne, vice president for Workforce Development and Continuing Education at the college. ‘‘Additional sites will be needed to address that.”

Montgomery College also established the Montgomery Coalition for Adult Literacy and ESOL in November 2004 to create a network of the 42 community and faith-based groups that offer adult literacy and ESOL services in the county.

What’s needed Increase state investment by $26.5 million over four or five years. Establish a statewide funding formula. Consolidate three existing state funding streams for adult education under the state Department of Education. Encourage workplace partnerships with business and provide incentives. Publish an annual report on how well the state is providing services.

Those groups provide 30,731 seats in classes each year, said Mary Freeman, who oversees the coalition. The Literacy Council of Montgomery County, one of the coalition’s providers, has 510 volunteer English language tutors for 790 people each year and a waiting list of 400.

Other providers turn away about a third of their enrollment, Freeman said.

The recommendations in the state funding report would allow 40,000 students to receive 120 hours of classroom instruction each year. Costs would be shared equally by state and local governments.

The report recommends a formula that would give each county money based on need and the cost of providing services in their market.

Read the report Click here.

In recent years, the waiting list for adult English language classes in the Montgomery County has held steady at about 2,000 at all times for classes taught both by the college and private groups.

While the greatest demand comes from Hispanic immigrants, others want to learn English as well.

Moussa Njoya Sany of Clarksburg took classes through Montgomery College at Seneca Valley High School in Germantown last fall.

‘‘It helped me improve my English, but it didn’t help me to improve more,” said Njoya Sany, a native French speaker who came to the United States from Cameroon for political reasons in 2001. ‘‘It helped me with the writing, but not speaking. I need to learn more.”

He would like to continue to improve his English skills and one day return to the kind of work he did in Cameroon — he was a sales representative for a French company that sold animal feed.

‘‘It was a good job with good pay,” he said.

For now, he is making $11 an hour washing dishes in a dining hall at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. There is no work during semester breaks in the winter and spring.

It is not enough for a father of five children, two of whom are enrolled at Montgomery College and three of whom plan to enter college after graduating from Seneca Valley this spring. He would like to work year-round.

‘‘With a big family like mine, every time I work seven months, I’m always short with money,” he said. ‘‘... I need a job where I can work 12 months, not seven months. Anything I can do to improve my earnings.”

Njoya Sany wanted to continue taking classes at Montgomery College’s Rockville campus this semester. But there was not enough space in the evening classes that he needed to accommodate his work schedule.

Njoya Sany’s situation is not unusual among newly arrived immigrant families, said Nguyen Minh Chau, an advocate for Vietnamese Americans and former Garrett Park councilwoman.

‘‘The parents have difficulty learning because they have to get into a job right away, earning a living,” Chau said. ‘‘Not many have learned to sign up for classes.”

For these reasons, estimates of the need for English language classes are probably low, predicted Chau, who worked with Sen. Patrick J. Hogan on a bill intended to increase funding for adult education programs.

The bill is ‘‘an exact reflection of the report” issued by the state panel, said Hogan (Dist. 39) of Montgomery Village.

It is one of at least three bills introduced earlier this month by Montgomery legislators in the General Assembly that is intended to address the growing need.

Del. Sheila Ellis Hixson (D-Dist. 20) of Silver Spring would grant a tax credit to businesses that sponsor adult basic literacy skill and English language classes for employees, following one of the report’s five recommendations.

Sen. Ida G. Ruben (D-Dist. 20) of Silver Spring introduced a bill to increase state grants for English language classes at community colleges from $2.5 million to $6 million. The bill seeks to increase per-pupil spending to $800 for 7,500 full-time students.