Testing Support for Multilingual College Students: Providing an Equitable Pathway

The number of immigrant and international multilingual learners enrolling in postsecondary education is on the rise. With this growth, there remain difficulties in identifying and supporting multilingual learners moving from K-12 to college due to demographic data collection procedures at the postsecondary level. Postsecondary institutions are challenged with appropriately identifying multilingual students in need of academic support and providing appropriate testing support and other academic supports. Our midWestern institution is set in a diverse urban setting with an increasing incidence of immigrants so we sought to meet both content and linguistic needs of these students at our institution. Through literature review research and stakeholder collaboration, we designed testing support guidelines and consultations for students and faculty to equitably support multilingual students taking course exams.