Selecting Students for Bilingual Education under the Keyes Agreement

Abstract

The Keyes agreement' details the procedures for identifying the students eligible for enrollment in the Denver bilingual education program. First, the agreement requires that a home language survey be conducted which asks whether: (1) the student's first language is other than English; and (2) someone speaks a non-English language in the student's home. Secondly, if the answer to either of these questions is "yes," the student is tested for English oral proficiency and, if in grade two or above, the student undergoes testing in academic achievement in language and reading as measured by a standardized achievement test; and all students are tested for English oral proficiency. A student is assigned to the bilingual program either if the oral proficiency test classifies him as limited English proficient or if the student scores below the cutoff score on the CTBS (Comprehensive Test of Basic Skills)-the thirtieth percentile for elementary school or the fortieth percentile for middle and high school. In this article I will examine whether this procedure can successfully identify students who would benefit from instruction in a non-English language as called for by the Keyes agreement. I begin with the problems encountered in trying to determine which students are eligible for bilingual education. Secondly, I discuss the multiple causes of poor performance in school-causes which were not taken into consideration as part of the Keyes selection methods. Lastly, I look at the problems associated with the specified methods for transferring students from the bilingual program into the regular English-speaking classroom.