When a Rush to Graduate Shoves Learning Aside

By Ellen Balleisen

It’s an unquestioned premise that high schools should strive to graduate students in a timely manner. But students suffer if schools try to rush them toward a diploma even when their skills are nowhere close to the 12th grade level. This is especially true with adolescent English-language learners, who often cannot attain academic proficiency in English by the age of a traditional high school graduate.

Two young adult immigrants to New York City offer poignant illustrations.

Amzatou emigrated from the Ivory Coast in 2006, when she was 16 years old. On arriving in the United States, she spoke French and several African languages but could not read or write in any of them. Her educational experiences since then are described in a report from the organization Advocates for Children of New York on immigrant students with low...