Faculty of Education - Theses
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ItemSlipping through the net : an investigative case study of the educational progress of newly-arrived non English speaking background immigrants in a state secondary school(University of Melbourne, 1996)The present study is an evaluation of ESL provision to newly-arrived NESB migrants in a state secondary school. The students in the target group had spent less than seven years in Australia. The case study was undertaken in a school with a high concentration of newly arrived NESB migrants. It attempts to establish whether the ESL assistance these students receive enables them to have equal access to curriculum options, and whether their retention and success rates at VCE are comparable to those of their Australian-born peers. The study is divided in six chapters. Chapter 1 outlines the history of ESL provision nationally and on a state level. It examines the policy documents to establish what the aims of the program were, and how these aims have adapted to the changing needs of successive migrant intakes. It examines the implementation of the program, and the theoretical framework within which it takes place. Evaluation theoreticians are consulted to place the program in an evaluative context. Chapter 2 provides the theoretical framework for the ESL program as well as for the case study and outlines how the methodology takes shape on both levels. It gives information about the community setting, the school and the student population. Finally it gives information about the questionnaire that was administered in the school, and explains what, why and how the data were gathered. Chapter 3 presents, mainly in a quantitative format, the information as derived from the questionnaire. It gives information about the students' ethnicity, linguistic background, English tuition prior to coming to Australia. It pays particular attention to the fragmented nature of their education and the disruption to their academic development prior to arrival. It also examines their first experiences in the Australian education system. The information analysed in Chapter 4 is extracted from school and other official documents pertaining to subject choices, the students' ability, (or inability, as the case may be) to access curriculum options at the start of their VCE years. Year 11 and 12 enrolments are examined, as well as success and failure rates in the different subject areas. Statistics on school retention and attrition rates at senior level complete the school data. Chapter 5 is given over to the students' voices. Four in-depth interviews of VCE students are followed by comments to open-ended questions from students in the entire ESL cohort surveyed. In Chapter 6 the information gathered in the preceding chapters is discussed. The obstacles that prevent ESL students from achieving either equality of access or equality of outcome are analysed in the light of relevant research. The conclusion contains some considerations for further action.