Roots of Federal ELL Case Run Deep

Supreme court ruling in suit could resonate far beyond Arizona

Nogales, Ariz.

Seventeen years ago, Miriam Flores sent her 5-year-old namesake off to school in this small city on the U.S.-Mexican border. Come fall, she’ll send 5-year-old Isabella, her youngest, and this time around, the 42-year-old Mexican-born homemaker hopes her daughter will get a better education.

The U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments later this month from a class action Ms. Flores joined on behalf of her first child in 1996. The lawsuit, Flores v. State of Arizona , contends that programs for English-language learners in Nogales are deficient and receive inadequate funding from the state.

Since it was filed in 1992, the lawsuit has pitted state officials against one another, and it has forced Nogales and school districts statewide to change the way they serve English-learners, including separating them for long periods of the...