District expands multilingual‑learner coaching after two years of pilot; French Broad reports measurable gains

District staff and regional partners briefed the board on the third year of a multi‑year multilingual learners (ML) initiative that combines administrator professional development, direct coaching for classroom coaches, monthly professional development for paraprofessionals, and school‑based coaching tied to data.

Annie Hibbs, director with the Regional Professional Development Program, described the partnership as “a gift to us to be able to partner with the district for multiple years,” and said the program has been refined each year using participant feedback. The initiative was presented as four components: administrator PD focused on observation and feedback, coaching for coaches, paraprofessional PD and school‑level coaching that coaches bring back to staff.

District presenters said year‑two data show gains in staff perceptions of their ability to support ML students and in shifts from a “novice” to “developing” and “proficient” categories on internal pre/post measures. The district also added a progress‑monitoring tool this year and integrated strategy suggestions into a data platform to help schools target listening, speaking, reading and writing interventions.

French Broad Elementary representatives described school‑level implementation. One ML coach said initial years felt like constant work with little visible growth, then the school saw “phenomenal” gains in assessment data that boosted staff morale. Dr. Leslie Molina, principal at French Broad, told trustees, “We are really all about shared leadership at French Broad,” and said students learned to present their own data and set personal goals. Presenters said paraprofessionals showed particularly high growth when given dedicated PD.

Board members asked about immersion language models. District staff explained that the district follows sheltered English immersion models aligned with state reporting and that full immersion models were not currently offered because, as the presenter put it, “there's not enough support if you just said all you get is immersion.” The district said WIDA assessments remain the annual benchmark and the new progress monitoring is intended to provide interim checks between WIDA administrations.

Nut graf: The ML project is a multi‑year capacity‑building effort that the district and partners report has improved staff practice and generated measurable staff‑level growth; French Broad provided school‑level examples and the district is adding progress monitoring for ML language levels.

Ending: Staff said year‑three work will continue the four components and that a more detailed update will return to the board on August 26.