Exempt All Immersion Programs from CoSA

We, the undersigned feel that the proposed CoSA changes adversely and disproportionately affect families with children currently enrolled in immersion programs in the county.

Specifically, we are requesting the Board to exempt immersion students from having to prove a unique hardship in order to gain admission into a high-school that has hitherto been identified as one where immersion students have the best chance to complete their language acquisition training.

We believe that the policy change will undermine support and participation in existing immersion programs, rendering MCPS’ immersion programs less relevant and competitive for students over time. More families may abandon immersion after elementary school and choose options that provide continuity between middle and high school. This would be a tremendous loss for the county.

We further request that the Board pursues a more thoughtful, transparent and data-driven process on which to propose changes to the existing CoSA Policy. MCPS needs to conduct comprehensive information gathering and analysis on how immersion students will be affected by changes to the current matriculation patterns well in advance of making any changes. The Board needs to fully examine this unintended consequence before making any changes to immersion students’ current feeder patterns. The statistical information ought to be released to the public at large in advance of any final decisions so that the affected communities have a chance to examine that information in a transparent way.

If the Board decides to implement the revised policy JEE, then Immersion students should be exempted, without risk of deterring the goal of reducing overcrowding because our understanding is that the share of CoSAs from immersion programs is insignificant.

Here is the link for CoSA details:
http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/policy/student-transfers.aspx