06.14.2022 | City Limits | “This was a multi-faceted program,” explained Rita Rodriguez-Engberg, director of AFC’s Immigrant Students’ Rights Project, “in which the DOE created a working group, of which we were part.” 

The group worked on finding the most effective ways to communicate with immigrant parents which included things like sending postcard notices to families’ homes; reaching families over the phone, text messages or robocalls; using local ethnic media; launching the first city-wide campaign to translate Special Education documents; and partnering with immigrant-facing, community-based organizations to share a variety of updates from the DOE.

According to a recently published data analysis by Advocates for Children of New York (AFC), an estimated 329,000 city students did not have a parent who speaks English fluently and 29,608 students’ parents have limited English proficiency (LEP) and speak a language outside those traditionally supported by the DOE. Read article | Leer en español