OSSE’s English learner policies are provided in the publication Delivering Education Services to English Learners. The following updates have been made since the May 2021 release:

• Exit Criteria: The state continues to use the ACCESS for ELLs composite score as a base for its criteria to exit a student from EL status. Beginning with the 2021-22 school year ACCESS administration, the exit criteria is now 5.0 or higher for students in kindergarten and 4.5 or higher for students in grades 1 through 12.
• New to US Definition: The state definition of a new to US student is now a student whose enrollment in a US school totals 12 months or fewer. The total does not need to be based on consecutive months of enrollment.
• School Information System (SIS) Requirements: When identifying a student as EL, LEAs should enter the following in their SIS in order to avoid receiving a Unified Data Error (UDE):
• o A non-English language in the Native Language field
• o The screener score, screener status and screener date
• Kindergarten English Language Proficiency Screeners: The K W-APT screener has been retired and replaced with the WIDA Screener for Kindergarten.
• EL Program Models: Details about EL program models are now hyperlinked in this publication under Step 1: Educational Approach.
• EL Status Changes: The Characteristics Conflict module in SLED replaces the submission of OSSE Support Tool (OST) tickets to report EL status changes.

Resources
Start of School Training for English Learner Points of Contact: View here.

For more information, please contact Lucia Cuomo at [email protected].