The Complex Terrain of Equity for Multilingual Learners in K–12 Education

Abstract

The field of multilingual learner education has become increasingly complex, with longstanding efforts focused on promoting access to multilingual learners being criticized for failing to transform systems responsible for these students’ marginalization. This essay brings clarity to the complex terrain of equity for multilingual learners in K–12 education by highlighting how conceptions of equity as access and as transformation underpin vexing issues in the field related to (a) how learners are categorized, (b) what is being learned, and (c) what instructional arrangements facilitate learning. The essay closes by proposing ways forward across research, policy, and practice toward shaping a field that is mutually engaged yet productively diverse as well as better positioned to foster interdisciplinary dialogue with other fields.