The Baltimore County Council will vote tonight to approve a $27,000 grant to beef up its work on welcoming and supporting residents who are immigrants.
The bill's sponsor, Councilman Izzy Patoka, is a first-generation American.
The grant is coming from the nonprofit American Immigration Council , with whom the county recently signed an agreement.
More than 12 percent of Baltimore County residents were born outside the U.S. - up from 7 percent twenty years ago, in 2000.
That's more than Baltimore City, for example, where about 8 percent of current residents are foreign-born.
The county now has a Welcoming and Belonging Strategic Plan , which promises to better engage immigrant and refugee communities .
That includes a focus on the educational system.
Baltimore County Public Schools' ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages) program spiked by more than 200 percent in the past decade , prompting BCPS to request 35 new ESOL positions.
The county's report notes :
BCPS primarily caters to American-born students, neglecting the diverse linguistic and cultural backgrounds of nonAmerican students, which marginalizes them and hinders their academic success. Additionally, there's a
lack of language access in parent-school communications, leading to an over-reliance on students as translators or interpreters for their families, causing emotional and cognitive strain on immigrant children, diminishing their learning experience, and potentially leading to academic challenges.
One of the biggest challenges, says the county, is that immigrants aren't even aware of the resources are available.
The funding will be partly used to buy "culturally appropriate food boxes from the Maryland Food Bank" (to encourage participation in community resource events), and to give a stipend to speakers at the events.
It will also be used to print a "Baltimore County Welcome Guide" in the county's five most commonly-spoken language.
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