Elementary and Secondary ESL programs within BC

Hey everyone, In light of the issues discussed so far, I think that income equality is highly related to the level of english proficiency that immigrants develop over time. In particular, it would be interesting to see how education in the form of ESL (English as a Second Language) programs affect the level of "settlement" that immigrants experience after moving here. Im guessing that those who took the ESL program at an early age would have been able to develop and consolidate a strong english foundation, which would prove to be beneficial as one moves into post-elementary education. In this train of thought, those who participated in the ESL program at an early age would perhaps be more likely to experience better job opportunities in the future. In addition, I would suspect that ESL programs early on would facilitate higher levels of post-secondary education. This is especially true in BC, with the significant amount of immigrants in UBC or SFU. Conversely, for immigrants moving to BC at an age suitable for high school, I would think that ESL programs would have a lesser effect on English learning. This is only a hypothesis, but I would guess that the older the immigrant, the higher the difficulty it would be for them to pick up English. This in turn, could then generally have an effect on motivation in adapting to BC's society. That being said, I think a potential survey could look like this:

What age did you immigrate to BC? (enter age)

Did you attend elementary school in BC yes/no (if yes, state number of years attended __ )

If so, did you enroll in the ESL program offered at your school? yes/no/there was no ESL program

If yes, how many years did you participate in the program? 1/2/3/4/5/6/7

Do you think that ESL education has helped you receive better job opportunities? Strongly Agree/Somewhat Agree/No Effect/Somewhat Disagree/Strongly Disagree

Do you think that ESL education has facilitated your assimilation into BC's society? Strongly Agree/Somewhat Agree/No Effect/Somewhat Disagree/Strongly Disagree

Feel free to post your thoughts on this issue, I look forward to what you guys have to say.

Hey Hiram,

There definitely could be a connection between the immigration settlement, and language programs offered/taken. The only concern I have is that these questions seem to tackle only the experiences of those who have taken an ESL program, and not of those immigrants who haven't taken the program. Do you perhaps think we should rephrase or include questions that would address all immigrants? Therefore the independent variable (being ESL program attendance), and it's effectiveness can be measured through assessing both those have taken it and those who haven't. I think it may be too one-sided if we observe only those who have taken the program.

Furthermore, is there an effective way of actually measuring assimilation and job opportunities offered to those who have taken ESL program and those who haven't taken the program on another scale other than the one you have proposed? The scale you've offered works for those who have taken the ESL program, but would it be just as effective for those who haven't? I.e. asking whether an individual thinks that they may have received better job opportunities if they had taken the ESL program (strongly agree - strongly disagree) can open up to biases of what the individual may perceive, as well as they may be comparing themselves to others who may have had other factors attributing to better job success apart from ESL program attendance.

I'd love to hear your feedback on my thoughts.

Hey Hiram,

This is a very interesting idea and one worth exploring more. I am unsure exactly of what we're trying to measure here. What is meant by the term "settlement"? Reading through again, essentially you've merged two research questions into one in (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong): "are ESL programs more effective in teaching English to kids at younger ages" and "does learning English affect job opportunities and/or opportunities in post-secondary education for new immigrants?" These are both good questions, and the latter obviously holds a considerable amount of weight in political discourse.

However, with only five survey questions to ask it will be very difficult to get a good idea of whether one or either of these are true. In order to ensure that our survey maximizes external validity it seems like we'd need to also include a sample of individuals who hadn't taken ESL, to compare the effectiveness of it as a medium to teach English to people. This gets us off-track a bit and is probably more fit for experimental studies.

Rather than focus on ESL as a medium, I would focus simply on the time in which new immigrants learned English. This may seem counter-intuitive: since all we've discussed so far is specifying and narrowing things down, but in this case if we focus on the mediums through which people learn English we're going to be expanding the potential for unwanted confounds and reducing the precious amount space we need to formulate questions. So again, rather than ESL, I would suggest we use age that the respondent remembers learning English. It would be important then to find out:

- Whether they already spoke English - If not, what age did they learn English (rather than using numbers, perhaps we can sacrifice some external validity for parsimony and use intervals of 6-7 years i.e. 1-7, 8-14, 15-21, etc.).

After that, we'd want to also narrow the focus down to either job opportunity or post-secondary education. Measuring the latter is much easier since degrees are a tangible thing we can point to, so perhaps we should go with that.

I'd like to hear your thoughts though. I know I'm quite picky so feel free to rip me apart too- criticism is I think, the best way we can develop these questions and come up with an effective study even given our operating constraints.

Hey Minjeong and Midas, Both of you bring up very valid points regarding this idea. In regards to Minjeong's concerns, it would most definitely be necessary to survey immigrants who did not take part in any ESL programs. That way, it becomes possible to measure the extent of the effect that ESL programs have on immigrant's lives in general. Questions such as "how has the ability to communicate in english affected your level of success within job opportunities in BC?" would initially allow us to deduce the level of importance that english has in general on job opportunities for immigrants, and follow up questions assessing the role of ESL in contributing to their current level of english proficiency would then allow us to deduce the overall impact that ESL has on all immigrants in terms of job opportunities. In addition, ESL only represents one of the many ways that immigrants could learn english. Enrolling in private classes, tutoring, or even self-study could be potential factors that we should consider. As for your second concern, I think we can solve this issue by surveying immigrants in terms of the overall level of "success" that they have experienced in BC, with or without ESL programs, and see if those who had participated in ESL faired more favorably.

As for Midas, it seems I have confounded my research focus. I am interested in measuring the effect of an immigrant's english proficiency level on their level of "success" within job opportunities in BC. I am also interested in seeing how effective government programs (hence ESL) are in helping immigrants learn english. It would seem pretty straightforward to assume that the better english one speaks in a predominantly english speaking society, the better one's job opportunities are. However, I have several concerns of my own regarding this assumption. Firstly, it would be necessary to attribute values to what we consider a "standard english proficiency"; the ability to communicate does not necessarily mean the ability to articulate. Such factors will come into play when considering job opportunities (interviews by potential employers and such). Therefore, it would also be necessary to measure the english proficiency level in the people we survey (I admit this could be difficult). As for the level of success, I think that a question like "How important was english for you in job seeking?" would allow us to qualitatively measure each individual's perceived level of importance that english had, and allow us to see whether the premise that better english leads to more jobs is true. If it is true (which I personally think it is), additional questions asking how the respondent learned english ("Did you participate in any public school funded programs whose aim was to teach english?") could then allow us to extrapolate the effectiveness in governmental programs that aimed to assimilate immigrants into BC's society. If governmental programs like ESL significantly helped immigrants in learning english, and higher levels of english proficiency was empirically linked to higher levels of job opportunities, then we can essentially gauge how good a job the BC government is doing to help immigrants "settle" into society.

My only concern with your suggestion of measuring the time in which a respondent has learned english is the fact that 1) people learn english at different speeds (motivation, natural mental capabilities, etc) and 2) there are varying levels of education (someone taking ESL at school compared to someone taking ESL at school AND hiring a private tutor/enrolling in weekend classes would achieve different results at the end of the year)

What do you think?

I think it's totally feasible to create a research question exploring the relationship between level of English and likelihood of success (in school, work, etc) but I think that if we focus on elementary school ESL programs our results won't be very interesting. It's a fair assumption that the longer you spend in an English speaking environment, the easier it will be to learn English; in fact, most kids who come here at the elementary school age end up completely fluent and with no/very slight accents. (Also, if I remember correctly, when you are in elementary school, your level of English is assessed and you are placed at the appropriate level of ESL; I don't think the students or parents have a choice, so there would be no variation - if the student was in a Lower Mainland elementary school, they would have been in the program)

If we want to focus on the relationship between English proficiency and success, I think it makes more sense to look at people who come here in high school or later. We could tailor our questions to this demographic, and maybe look at immigrants who chose to take government provided English courses, no courses or other private courses.

Hey guys, so I have read this proposition on a question related to the ESL proficciency and overall success in immigrating. However, first of all I feel like this topic although very interesting, as it would proide us with answers as to why someone's immigation process is facilitated while others are not and the impact comming from their English profficiency, it might be a little hard to examine. I absolutely believe that there is some sort of causal link, I have lived here with my famimly for 10 years and I do see a difference in my mom and dad's fluency in the English language, however, their level of English does not seem to affect their interaction or success within the community or even their job acquisition when they arrived (a small accent may not infringe on a lot!) Not all immigrants take ESL courses, and a lot who do, like it was mentioned, are most likely to be older than high school students, as before that age, it is expected that they will learn at school and due to their age, they are able to acquire it quicker. Also, those who do come later, as adults may also come with an offer already, or a job waiting for them, so in relaity IF they do not have already acquired fluency in ENglish, their lives may not be affected that much in a negative way, take the Asian population- a loooot do not even speak fluent English aand still manage to live successfuly every day lives (perhaps not as integated in to the "Canadian" society thogh).

I just feel this is a difficult topic to research to be honest, but if there is more support on this topic I am open to feedback!

I think what we have to consider with this question is whether or not ESL is by choice. From personal experience many elementary schools don't really allow a choice for ESL enrollment. In some schools even if you were born here,if you are a visible majority you are made to take ESL. Does this not hinder the success rate of immigration? Kids who are introduced to their immigrant status may begin to classify themselves as different and thereby maintaining an immigrant mentality. Also in ESL you are not exposed to the level of language other kids your age are and may in fact depreciate English levels.

It might be better to have questions on the age of arrival in Canada and how age affects the ease of fitting in.

I strongly agree with Myra's concern. There are many confounding variables that could make the relationship between "experience with the ESL program" and "success in assimilating into Canadian culture/workplace" spurious. It is very difficult for us to account for these variables, and impossible to control all, if any of them. In addition to the fact that many Canadians don't need to use English in order to get on with their daily lives, most new immigrants already have varying degrees of language proficiency when they first come into Canada (some speak and write English much better than the average Canadian or have it as their first language). All of these factors make these survey questions difficult to carry out practically.

I also think the using of the word "assimilation" could be problematic. It is a highly subjective concept that vary from each each individual. Even if we were to try to define it as a general, concrete theme, it would be nearly impossible for us as researchers to agree upon, let alone the hundreds of respondents who will be answering the survey.

Anyway, I am definitely interested in finding out the relationship between English proficiency and professional success for new Canadians. I do think that there is a causal relationship between the two, and it's important to pin-point that relationship for the sake of improving government programs that aim to help new Canadians. However, there are just so many confounding factors that could disprove the relationship. I don't think it would be feasible to tackle this question with the limited survey space and resources that we have for this particular assignment. It would be definitely interesting to create a comprehensive survey (say, 30 - 50 questions) on this specific subject targeted only toward new immigrant respondents who have had formal or informal experience with the Canadian ESL system.

I'd also share Myra's and Lucy's concerns about the confounding variables for this research question; many potentially challenging to control for, but I wouldn't quite dismiss them as 'impossible' just yet. The bottom line is this: there are of course varying degrees of either English or French proficiency among immigrants who are seeking permanent residency in Canada, and like someone else said in another thread somewhere (sorry there just too many to find it), there are also numerous application categories to which an immigrant may identify with; including familial ties, previous professional and/or trade experience, etc.

I started a thread with a couple possible questions a few days ago, and I missed the mark a little bit in terms of addressing the right topic: admission vs settlement... That in mind, I can see us going down a similar path here in Hiram's thread; though English/French proficiency may not be the 'deal breaker' on the success of an immigrant's application to get in to BC, it certainly may play a role in the immigrant's ability to demonstrate successful integration into his/her community when applying for permanent residency. I don't think I'm making too large an assumption when I say those who can't speak English or French all that well in BC will on average, not receive a high paying job; a unit of analysis we can easily identify with 'successful settlement'.

That being said, ESL programs are prevalent not only in the public school system, but are abundantly available in the form of night classes etc, for adults to take in their transition from 'landed immigrant' to 'permanent resident' or Canadian citizen. However, like many of you have suggested, ESL programs are not the only option out there for the immigrants; a variety of colleges and other institutions accept applicants on a roling basis, offering a variety of language instruction, like the services offered here. Perhaps we can tweak the questions a bit so that a larger base of respondents could identify with the question of where/how much/how helpful language instruction was in getting a 'higher paying' job then what you could have got first stepping on Canadian soil?

I'm not saying everyone's shutting down Hiram's thread, but there is definitely a 'negative' trend, so I thought I'd mix this up a little for scholarly purposes, and point out that this idea, once tweaked a little could actually be a worth while path to explore earnestly.

A detailed answer on where one lives would be helpful in finding out how important proficiency in english has been to immigrants lives. For example, someone who speaks only Punjabi living in a certain part of Surrey could likely live and work without must difficulty, and the same goes for many groups in different areas. Asking something along the lines of "what is the dominant language in your community" may help explain a person's reason for why a person did or did not take advantage of ESL services. Of course, we would need to produce the survey in one or two other languages in order to get a response from people who don't speak english (as was suggested previously). Not taking advantage of such services may not have been an issue of not knowing about it or being resistant to integrating, for many it may have simply been unneccessary as they can get along fine without it.