Secondary Long-term Emergent Bilingual Students’ Educational Needs

Secondary long-term emergent bilingual students have difficulties in learning due to their academic gaps accumulated over years of schooling. To understand these students’ academic challenges and their educational needs, a qualitative research study was conducted grounded a naturalistic inquiry approach. Individual in-depth interviews were the main sources of data, and language and academic performance records were collected to examine programs and services participants had received. Findings revealed that participants’ academic struggles were associated with their limited learning opportunities over years of previous schooling. The results suggest a critical need of adequate programs and services to address these students’ significant academic gaps.