Blog Author: Paul Quaintance
Our Lens
When the Chicago Language Center (CLC) launched the English Language Institute (ELI) in 2015 to support the University’s community of users of English as an Additional Language (EAL), some of us paused to chuckle at how the new institute’s mission might not adhere to the Center’s guiding principles. After all, at first glance, embracing English as the global lingua franca seemed to sit somewhat uncomfortably within the mission of the CLC, especially as reflected in the quote from Alfred the Great’s preface to his translation of Pope Gregory I’s Liber Pastoralis which adorns the walls of our home on the second floor of Cobb Hall:
“They didn’t imagine that men would ever become so negligent and learning so decline; they deliberately left [the Latin texts untranslated] for they wished that the more languages we knew the more learning there should be ….”
Here we were, it seemed at first, advancing English language hegemony. But the laughter didn’t last long as we considered more deeply our role in supporting the intercultural experience of English speakers, additional, dominant, or otherwise. Sometimes teaching English, other times advocating for users of English as an Additional Language, and still other times cultivating and helping anyone navigate a rich, intercultural space, we’ve grown to understand more of what it means–and what it takes–to participate in the multilingual environment at UChicago.
In fact, as our view of the learning environment has evolved, we have come to see our work as scaffolding full cultural participation for our learners. With that participation looking different for every learner, understanding the individual is fundamental to providing structured support for their cultural engagement. To understand a learner’s needs, we reflect on our team’s own participation in additional cultures. We draw upon our identities as foreign language learners, bilingual and bicultural individuals, and additional language users across domestic, academic, and recreational contexts. We rigorously analyze the needs of both our mandated priority learners, including graduate students and postdocs, and of others in the community, including undergraduate and non-degree visiting students, staff, faculty, alumni, partners and spouses, and non-affiliates.
To broaden our understanding of learners and their needs beyond those who we regularly encounter at UChicago, Paul Quaintance (ELI Language Pedagogy Specialist) recently spoke with Jacqueline Cunningham, Chair of the World Languages & English Language Learners Department at Harold Washington College, part of the City Colleges of Chicago. Cunningham shared insights into both the learners in her program and the broader cultural and political landscape shaping their experiences. She confirmed that the support they need often goes beyond learning forms and patterns in language to include gaining pragmatic skill, recognizing social norms, acquiring cultural knowledge, and applying communication strategies.
Students need the basics in professional and classroom norms. One example is when students are late for class. Americans ‘sneak in and sit’ then apologize later — Students new to US classrooms may say, ‘Hi everybody! How are ya? Sorry I’m late, teacher.’
Echoing a general trend toward the use of “plain language” to improve access to education, she also includes advocating on behalf of her students as part of supporting them, noting that she often finds college prompts to be needlessly complicated:
An ESL professor would say, in three sentences, what that prompt or topic is. The average US professor may have a full page of instructions… The buildup is often simply too much information for English learners. They will try to answer every individual question in a sentence when the questions lead into the writing task.
More of Cunningham’s insights can be found within the learner profiles below. We would like to thank her for sharing with us her years of experience in educational leadership and ESL and bilingual education serving the City of Chicago’s multilingual community and for helping us see the full range of the City’s English Language Learners. If you see yourself in any of the descriptions that follow, we wish to join you in enhancing your cultural participation in North America and communities around the world which use the English language.
Our Learners
Multilingual International Students and Scholars: Often the “default” learner group at UChicago, these individuals have been educated primarily in a non-English language and learned English later. Some may be confident speakers but struggle with academic writing; others are the reverse. Many also navigate cultural transitions, increasingly frequent immigration challenges, and expectations tied to race or nationality.
Students Schooled in a National but Not Home Language: Some students have grown up speaking one language at home (like Cantonese or Zapotec) and received formal education in a national language (such as Mandarin or Spanish). They may bring significant experience navigating the complexities of intercultural environments.
Learners from Countries Where English Is Official but Not Dominant: Students from countries like Nigeria or India may have been partially schooled in English but also speak other home or regional languages. High proficiency in English often coexists with communication styles and cultural reference points that don’t always align with North American expectations.
This group of students have been working and studying in English their whole lives. But culturally, and academically there’s a cultural difference. So global educators teach them how to write essays in the American style for an American Audience.
U.S.-Based Bilingual Learners: Children of immigrants often grow up navigating multiple linguistic and cultural worlds — hearing a heritage language at home and English at school. Academic English can pose challenges even when conversational fluency is strong, especially when paired with first-generation college experiences or racialized assumptions.
At Harold Washington College, Cunningham sees how U.S. policy changes are impacting these learners directly. She notes that with the recent executive order establishing English as the national language, offering classes in a student’s first language — an important support at a few institutions — is now threatened:
It’s true that in the current political environment the student enrollment in our program is diminishing. This is also indirectly manifesting in aggressive pushback from the local administration creating policies allowing students with beginning skills into freshman composition for English native speakers.— Over decades of defending bilingual education, my response has generally been the same: If the English Language isn’t necessary in colleges, why not just offer psychology or sociology in Chinese, Vietnamese, or Ukrainian? Prior to March 1st, 2025, we didn’t have a national language and bilingual colleges were an option. I advocated for that for decades. That is harder to even imagine now.
What’s going to happen to the only bilingual college program in the city? One does exist. At this college, there are classes in Spanish and classes in English. And for many subjects, the students have the choice of what language they want to take the class in.
Heritage Language Learners: Exposed to a non-dominant language early in life, these learners may understand or speak the language but not read or write it fluently. They may use their heritage language in familiar but not academic or professional contexts.
Beyond official policies, Cunningham points out that many bilingual learners face barriers built on misinformation — including assumptions that because they speak English, they don’t need additional support in writing, academic skills, or cultural navigation. Inclusive pedagogy, she stresses, must recognize these realities and provide appropriate scaffolding.
Generation 1.5 Learners: Often born abroad but raised in the U.S., these learners often acquire the “interlanguage” of their parents, with communication challenges in both their home language and English.
I’ve been working with 1.5 since 1999. To be honest, they’re a lot like my Italian grandma who arrived in the United States at 5 years old. The parents may not have excellent English. However, the kids have been in youth baseball, been out with their friends, gone through elementary and high school, been to parties, watched the Simpsons for 20 years in reruns. They know English.
However, If the parents are not balanced bilinguals they may be in-between languages or speaking a dialect, which native English speakers think are mistakes but are just signs of language change. There may be unusual syntax or phrases from that interlanguage or dialect which have been reinforced by teachers in the high school who are also members of that linguistic community.
It’s not like they didn’t go to elementary school and have language arts classes. They’ve been reading in English. What teachers need to do now is remind them to [shift to academic English]. Deep in them they have all of the English knowledge. A great teacher can take a 1.5 in English composition and just remind the student, in this writing paper you’ve got to do it the other way not the way people talk in their community, though it’s valid communication.
Stronger Oral Than Written English: These learners have often acquired English through work, community, or informal interaction. They’re comfortable speaking but less practiced with writing, especially in academic or professional registers. Their learning is shaped by practical experience, and they may juggle full-time jobs, family responsibilities, or nontraditional academic paths.
Stronger Written than Oral English: Conversely, some learners have had a great deal of academic English writing instruction, but little exposure to oral discourse.
There are students who are amazing writers from China or other countries, but mostly in Asia. These students are legitimately great writers and great readers. But, students have told us that the faculty in their home country didn’t feel comfortable working on speaking and listening.
Learners from Cultures with Overlap to U.S. Norms: Students from the Americas or parts of Europe may find some transitions easier, but assumptions based on perceived similarity can hide real challenges—like adjusting to classroom dynamics or decoding cultural references. Their experiences highlight how language proficiency doesn’t always equate to comfortable and meaningful cultural participation.
Literate in a First Language, New to English: Some learners come to English with strong literacy in another language—lawyers, doctors, or academics in their home country. They often bring strong critical thinking skills but may lack confidence in oral fluency, English writing, and most often nuanced cultural practices.
Learners with Low Literacy in Any Language: These learners are developing foundational literacy skills in English and sometimes their home language, too. Literacy can open doors to metalinguistic learning strategies, but it can also interfere with additional language pronunciation by transferring first language spelling patterns.
Adult vs. Child Learners: The “critical period” when language learning—especially pronunciation and accent—emerges rapidly gives children an advantage. Adults, however, benefit from stronger cognitive strategies and can jump start initial progress by applying metacognitive learning strategies.
The department strongly frowns upon putting students who arrived here before the age of 13 in ESL Language courses–[the end of the] critical period. I tell them ESL classes are not the right fit for you.
Academics Using Sources from an Additional Language: In an age increasingly shaped by generative AI, the ability to read and comprehend texts in additional languages is more important than ever. Scholars and other professionals who rely on machine translations or summaries risk missing the nuance, argumentation, and cultural context inherent in the original. With targeted reading comprehension training, for example, a Chinese researcher producing scholarly work in Mandarin is able to engage directly with English-language sources and integrate them into their work with a degree of precision and critical awareness that artificial renderings cannot match.
UChicago’s Academic and Professional Reading Institute (APRI) is at the forefront of developing training programs in advanced additional-language reading comprehension. By equipping participants in the economy of ideas to access knowledge in its original linguistic form, APRI ensures these workers remain uniquely competitive. Alfred the Great would be proud, indeed.
We are in this Together
Like the language learners the ELI staff support, our own identities overlap and intersect, creating unique and complex contexts for teaching and learning. In the face of machine translation and growing nationalistic trends around the globe, the need for intercultural communication and multilingual education in the spirit of Alfred the Great’s quotation in Cobb Hall has never been greater.
Wherever you are coming from, wherever you are going, and whatever paths have brought us together, the ELI remains committed to supporting you as you find your voice in English, one that will continue to grow, can be clearly heard, and will make an impact in your communities.
