Welcome to the
 Department of
  English Language Acquisition

Bonjour! Konichiwa! Al salaam a'alaykum! Ni hao! Hello! ¡Hola! Chào! Bon giorno! Guten Tag! Jambo! Zdravstvuite! Shalom! Dobar Dan!

The ELA Department is responsible for providing English language acquisition services to more than 13,500 English language learners in the Denver Public Schools. More than 137 languages are spoken in DPS. As of October 1, 2008, Spanish is the primary language for 11,924 of the 13,639 English language learners.

The goal of the ELA program is to use efficient and effective educational methods to provide students with the English language skills they need to meaningfully participate in the district's mainstream English language instructional program. Parents of students who speak a language other than English choose whether or not they want their child to participate in the ELA program. For those children who do participate in the ELA program, it is expected that they will have sufficient proficiency in English to meaningfully participate in supported English language classrooms after three years in the program.

This website is designed to provide you with valuable information about the Department of English Language Acquisiton and the services it provides in the Denver Public Schools. If you have additional questions, please contact the ELA Hotline at 720-423-8155.

 

What's New?...

ELA Teacher Qualification Training 

  • Fall 2009 UCD course registration is now closed.
  • Spring 2010 ELA/UCD online registration will begin Friday, December 11, 2009 at 9:00 a.m.  The Spring 2010 ELA/UCD course schedule is posted here.  Courses are available on a first-come, first-served basis.  Emails explaining the spring 2010 step-by-step registration process will be sent to designated teachers in November. For registration instructions, please refer to this email.  Please email us at ela_training@dpsk12.org if you do not receive this email by Monday, November 23rd.  
  • PDU summer 2009 information is posted at http://ela.dpsk12.org, click the ELA Teacher Qualification Training Program on the right side of the page.  The information is located in the middle of the web page.