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About Hermiston herald. (Hermiston, Or.) 1994-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 18, 2019)
LOCAL A6 • HERMISTONHERALD.COM WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 2019 Low English Learner grad rates inspire change By JESSICA POLLARD STAFF WRITER Scott Depew had to deliver some bad news last year when he was vice principal at Hermiston High School. “I had two English Learner stu- dents who had plenty of credits, but they were both lacking two full credits of communications,” Depew said. “Getting them to understand that they’d have to stay a fi fth year at school was a chal- lenge. When you’re 19, you want to leave school and get a job.” This year, as Depew settles into his new position as director of sec- ondary education at the Hermiston School District, he knows it’s not an unfamiliar story. According to a report released this summer by the Oregon Depart- ment of Education, by the end of 2017 to 2018 school year, just 33.3% of the English Learners (EL) who entered the Hermiston High School in 2013 graduated, compared to the near-65% state average. “We understand there’s no quick fi x with this,” Depew said. “We started asking, ‘What is the hold up? What is the reason these kids aren’t graduating?’” The answer was, overwhelm- ingly, a lack of language arts and communications credits. This year, the high school will utilize shel- tered communications classes in an effort to get EL students out the door with a diploma. The classes will be taught by EL-certifi ed teachers, and offered to high schoolers as a way to earn communications credits while also improving their language skills. The classes incorporate a reading intervention program recently insti- tuted by the district at the middle and high school levels, called Read 180. Kathryn Davis, an English lan- guage development teacher at the high school, said it’s a little too soon to tell for sure how the pro- gram will impact EL students. But she’s hopeful. “So far, it’s been wonder- ful. Behavioral issues have gone down,” she said. She said the English Language Profi ciency Assessment (ELPA) test is one of the only data points where students learning English can see their progress. Read 180, according to Davis, has plenty of data points good for celebrating small successes. Davis said that the addition of more EL teachers has been a help, and has been import- ant to accommodate the growth that the district sees in students who don’t speak English as their fi rst language. Loretta Fitterer, the EL New- comer teacher at Armand Lar- ive Middle School, has seen that growth fi rsthand. Last spring, there were 13 mid- dle schoolers in the Newcomer Center program, which is a pro- gram for kids who arrive to Amer- ica and need a language boost before moving onto traditional core classes. This year, there are 26. This is the fi rst year that middle schoolers and elementary school- ers attending the Newcomer Center will have separate classes. “The needs developmentally for a middle schooler are much differ- ent. It’s easier we separate them and focus,” she said. “I think the need is there, and districts are step- ping up.” Man accidentally shoots himself in the leg Artist opens gallery at Hat Rock home By JADE MCDOWELL NEWS EDITOR Art afi cionados are invited to view the works of artist Jean Christofori How- ton at a pop-up art gallery at her Hat Rock home next month. The show will be Oct. 12 from 3-8 p.m. at 34009 Beach Shore Drive, with art spread covering walls throughout the large, split- level home. Sno Road Win- ery will serve wine and chocolate. “I have a lot of new work,” Howton said. Howton has shown her paintings and drawings at galleries around the West Coast and Europe, and was the 2005 guest of honor for the Spring Fair in Les Ande- lys, France. Her works range from oil paintings of pastoral scenes to abstract pieces in mixed media. Many of her works are inspired by the French countryside. She moved to Normandy, France for 10 years after her husband died, before eventually returning to their home in Hat Rock. Last year she decided to Both Fitterer and Davis know fi rst-hand the challenges that stu- dents learning English face when it comes to maintaining success at school. She said that by the time many students reach freshman year, they hate school. They feel stuck in EL, and they are repeatedly failing. “In my experience,” Davis said, “students who are having a lot of trouble may have been born here in America, but their parents don’t speak English at home. When they show up at kindergarten, they are already at a huge defi cit.” Fitterer said that for many kids, English isn’t just a second lan- guage. It might be a third or fourth. She said that many of her stu- dents speak Aztecan dialects at home, attend school in their home countries in Spanish, and arrive at the U.S. to eventually learn English. HERMISTON HERALD A 19-year-old shot him- self in the leg on Satur- day afternoon outside of Pendleton. Umatilla County Sher- iff’s Offi ce undersheriff Jim Littlefi eld said the incident was still under investigation but appeared to be an acci- dental shooting. The fi rearm involved was a shotgun. Littlefi eld said he didn’t have any more informa- tion to release until after the investigation was complete, but KVEW television sta- tion reported the man was from Hermiston and was transported to St. Anthony Hospital in Pendleton for treatment. Girls in Science explore zombies Female students in sixth- eighth grade who love all things STEM — Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics — are invited to apply for Girls in Science. Presented by the North- east Oregon Area Health Education Center, the event is Saturday, Oct. 26 at East- ern Oregon University in La Grande. With a theme of “Zombie Apocalypse: Is It Actually Possible?,” stu- dents will put their knowl- edge and skills to work to HH fi le photo Artist Jean Christofori Howton has shown her work at galleries in the Pacifi c Northwest and in Europe. host her fi rst home gallery show and it was such as suc- cess that she is bringing it back for a second year. “I’ve got paintings every- where,” she said. She said the fi rst time around she was nervous about how the show would go and had several friends on hand to help customers. This year she plans to take time to speak with each customer personally about her art. 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