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Maxwell Elementary School has produced multilingual children for nearly two decades, and now administrators at other elementary schools want to add Spanish immersion tracks to their curricula next school year.
The adoption of such programs would address the high demand for entry into Maxwell, a Spanish immersion magnet school with a 200-child waiting list.
"I think when we have programs that are that successful, we need to find ways to duplicate those," Superintendent Stu Silberman said.
A few weeks ago, Fayette County Schools sent letters to parents on the Maxwell waiting list seeking their opinion on additional Spanish immersion programs. Liberty Elementary School, which will open in the fall, sent out its own letters to parents to explore the potential for an immersion track.
Many parents responded positively, said Jack Hayes, the district's director of student achievement.
Liberty and Russell Cave Elementary School will meet with parents soon to discuss adding immersion tracks, Hayes said.
The immersion program at Maxwell has been popular since it began in 1990. From kindergarten through fifth grade, students participate in a partial immersion program, meaning they spend half the day taking classes such as math and science in Spanish and half in English.
Students who want to participate in the immersion program through 12th grade then go to Bryan Station middle and high schools.
Only about 96 children are admitted into Maxwell each year through a lottery system, Hayes said. After that, a child must pass a Spanish competency test to enter the program.
Studies have shown that children who acquire a second language at an early age have more flexibility in thinking, greater sensitivity to language and a better understanding of their native language, according to the Washington-based Center for Applied Linguistics.
"In immersion programs, the kids develop a certain level of proficiency that they can't develop in any other way," said Alicia Vinson, the Fayette County Schools' world-languages specialist. Vinson was the first teacher hired for the Maxwell immersion program.
If site-based councils decide to adopt the track system, they will begin with kindergarten classes, then introduce the program in higher grades as those children move up.
Unlike Maxwell's programs, parents could choose whether to enroll their kids in the Spanish track.
Schools would have to hire Spanish-speaking teachers, but the cost would be minimal, Silberman said.
Liberty principal Vickie Burke said half of the kindergarten parents who received letters about the program were interested in adopting it at Liberty.
"If that option is available at Liberty, I just feel like I can't pass that up," Burke said.
