An ethnographic case study of educational programs and outcomes in a charter school in Calgary

Abstract

The critical tum in language policy and planning has transformed it into a discipline that can bring the inequalities in social structures to light. In the field of language education, it can reveal how the policies and guidelines regulated at the macro­level impose their discourse on the micro-level and influence the perceptions and practices of their recipients. Ethnography of language policy has been used to explore the interplay and interaction between the macro and micro-level discourses and investigate the areas of inconsistency, ambiguity and contradiction. It is applied to inquire about the perceptions and experiences of policy recipients, to give voice to the underrepresented, and call for policy reform. While Alberta is serving a considerable number of ESL students, these students have been documented to be underachievers, both academically and socioculturally. This study explores the outcomes of the interpretation and implementation of ESL education polices by looking into the perceptions and practices of the agents in a charter school in Alberta. The findings of this study suggest that the educational objectives of ESL policies cannot be fully achieved unless the actual experiences of agents at the micro-level are taken into consideration. The study indicates that there are barriers hindering the academic and sociocultural integration of ESL students into the mainstream education system. It suggests that the picture illustrating ESL students as underachievers needs to be replaced by acknowledging these students' academic and sociocultural potential through policy reform that empowers the education system to help them reach their full potential.