Mathematics Scan
Category: Teacher and Leader Development
Dual-language immersion (DLI) programs have proliferated across the United States, yet evidence on their effects for English Learner-designated (EL) students in large, diverse urban districts remains limited. This study examines DLI's effects on attendance and reclassification—two outcomes that worsened for ELs following the COVID-19 pandemic. Using restricted student-level data from the Los Angeles Unified School District (2015–2022), we employ doubly-robust estimation to compare DLI and non-DLI students within the same schools. DLI enrollment is associated with substantially higher attendance for all student subgroups, including low-income ELs—an important finding given that attendance is strongly related to student engagement and long-term academic success. For reclassification, while DLI students show modestly lower rates in K–2, these differences disappear by third grade. By the end of elementary school, ELs in DLI reclassify at rates indistinguishable from peers in English-only classrooms, regardless of income status or home language-program language match. These findings directly address a common parental concern—that DLI will delay children's English acquisition—and the evidence suggests otherwise. As California seeks to dramatically expand bilingual education in the state, these results support DLI as an equity-enhancing intervention that benefits students while developing their multilingual assets.
Keywords
Dual-language immersion, Bilingual Education, English Learners, Multilingual Learners, Reclassification, Attendance, Culturally-Relevant Pedagogy
Education level
Document Object Identifier (DOI)
10.26300/fbbe-fb44
