School Counselor Advisory Council

(FRANKFORT, KY) – Members of the Kentucky Department of Education’s (KDE’s) School Counselor Advisory Council discussed ways that their schools help multilingual learners during their meeting on Feb. 11.

Will Spalding, multilingual learner specialist in KDE’s Office of Teaching and Learning, shared facts about multilingual learners in Kentucky.

He explained that English learners (ELs) are students identified as eligible for English language development services. During the 2024-2025 school year, 54,252 ELs were served across more than 1,000 schools in 147 Kentucky districts.

“That’s a record number,” Spalding said. “We know that your classrooms, your schools are a great representation of our country and our world as Kentucky classrooms start to reflect that more and more.”

Multilingual learners are students who are developing proficiency in multiple languages. This includes current ELs, students who do not qualify for EL services and those who have achieved English proficiency.

Kentucky public schools serve more than 84,000 multilingual learners, representing nearly 13% of the total student enrollment from kindergarten through grade 12.

Spalding said Spanish is the primary native language for most of Kentucky’s multilingual learners, but there are still a wide variety of home countries and languages represented. Other languages that are the most predominant are Swahili, Arabic, Kinyarwanda, Nepali, and French.

Spalding said school counselors play an important role in helping multilingual students both integrate into the community and prepare for their future careers.

“I want to say thank you for helping our students feel seen and valued and welcomed in schools,” Spalding said. “You’re building connections and getting to know students and understanding their family backgrounds and the dynamics and struggles that many have.”

He said school counselors help connect students with needed school and community resources, such as Family Resource and Youth Services Centers. Counselors also help English learners and multilingual learners with intentional scheduling and guidance to find the right path to graduation and postsecondary opportunities.

He asked council members what their schools are doing to support multilingual learners.

Council member Paula Moore, a counselor at Bowen Elementary School (Jefferson County) said students who were part of the Student Technology Leadership Project (STLP) recorded welcome videos for multilingual students and families last year. Video topics included how students carpool, how lunches work at Bowen, clubs that students can join and how they can sign up for extracurriculars.

“The students did a really great job,” Moore said. “They interviewed different staff members and then they helped translate it, so that’s been really powerful.”

New students can scan QR codes to watch the videos as they arrive at school. Moore said the projects won a category at the STLP state championship.

She also said Bowen has a welcome team that has some students who speak multiple languages, and they give tours to welcome new students. She said they have about 32 different languages this year at the school.

“It’s hard enough being a new student at a new school and then throw a language barrier on top of that. I say there might be a language barrier, but that doesn’t mean that there’s a communication barrier,” Spalding said. “We can communicate with all students and so that smile and that welcoming body language and presence is so important.”

In other news:

  • This meeting was the last meeting of the School Counselor Advisory Council with current council members as their terms expire this spring. Applications for new members will open in April.