Report was part of district’s regular cycle of doing in-depth reviews of all aspects of its K-12 curriculum
By John Tredrea, Special Writer
The Hopewell Valley Regional School District’s World Language Program has been given high marks by a consultant who made an in-depth study of the program and reported on her findings and recommendations at Monday night’s Hopewell Valley Regional Board of Education meeting.
Her report is part of the district’s regular cycle of doing in-depth reviews of all aspects of its K-12 curriculum.
Consultant Rosanne Zeppieri, who met with faculty, parents and students during her evaluation of the World Language Program, said the program has a number of strong points.
Accompanying her Monday night was the program’s supervisor, Rafael Meulener, and Spanish teacher Rebecca Mora.
”Your World Language programs embody current theory and research in the field,” Ms. Zeppieri said.
”You have strong department leadership and a very collaborative and professional staff,” she said.
Another strength, she added, is the district ‘s “rigorous course offerings, including Advanced Placement courses in Spanish, French, German and Latin.”
She recommended that the district “continue to offer high-quality professional development opportunities” for faculty.
A way to expand on those opportunities, she said, is to make use of the Model Program Centers located throughout the state. “Visit those centers, observe their programs in action and share ideas and resources there,” she suggested.
She also suggested that the district consider starting a dual language immersion program, in which students study some of their course work in a foreign language.
She said research in other states has shown students in those programs “come out stronger” in both English and the foreign language than they would have if they hadn’t had the dual language immersion course work.
Another suggestion was that the district consider devoting more classroom time to World Language study.
The World Language Program here includes English as a second language (ESL) courses.
Mr. Muelener said the district has about 30 ESL students now. The native languages of those students are quite varied, he said, including Mandarin Chinese.