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Digest of Education Statistics
2015 Tables and Figures All Years of Tables and Figures Most Recent Full Issue of the Digest


Table 204.27. English language learner (ELL) students enrolled in public elementary and secondary schools, by grade and home language: Selected years, 2008-09 through 2013-14
Grade and home language Number of ELL students Percentage distribution of ELL students Number of ELL students as a percentage of total enrollment
2008-091 2009-101 2011-121 2012-13 2013-14 2008-091 2009-101 2011-121 2012-13 2013-14 2008-091 2009-101 2011-121 2012-13 2013-14
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16
Total 4,685,746 4,647,016 4,635,185 4,850,293 4,929,989 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 9.7 9.7 9.6 10.0 10.1
Grade                              
Kindergarten 629,195 615,615 657,391 667,835 667,665 13.4 13.2 14.2 13.8 13.5 17.3 16.7 17.5 17.4 17.4
Grade 1 621,541 617,599 646,362 665,327 665,612 13.3 13.3 13.9 13.7 13.5 16.8 16.6 17.1 17.4 17.1
Grade 2 583,025 576,336 585,702 609,804 630,475 12.4 12.4 12.6 12.6 12.8 15.8 15.7 15.8 16.4 16.6
Grade 3 495,814 511,545 500,032 540,396 558,925 10.6 11.0 10.8 11.1 11.3 13.4 13.8 13.5 14.5 15.0
Grade 4 406,966 420,145 417,616 428,119 439,529 8.7 9.0 9.0 8.8 8.9 11.2 11.4 11.4 11.6 11.9
Grade 5 333,975 336,194 338,174 367,088 361,651 7.1 7.2 7.3 7.6 7.3 9.2 9.2 9.1 10.0 9.8
Grade 6 288,784 277,971 273,457 288,085 293,778 6.2 6.0 5.9 5.9 6.0 8.0 7.6 7.3 7.7 8.0
Grade 7 263,483 254,830 239,156 255,395 267,416 5.6 5.5 5.2 5.3 5.4 7.2 7.0 6.5 6.8 7.1
Grade 8 237,269 233,332 214,896 227,844 239,817 5.1 5.0 4.6 4.7 4.9 6.4 6.4 5.8 6.2 6.4
Grade 9 268,927 258,728 244,266 255,008 261,564 5.7 5.6 5.3 5.3 5.3 6.5 6.3 6.2 6.4 6.6
Grade 10 218,235 211,691 201,724 202,774 202,377 4.7 4.6 4.4 4.2 4.1 5.7 5.6 5.4 5.4 5.4
Grade 11 172,084 175,544 162,804 170,847 168,437 3.7 3.8 3.5 3.5 3.4 4.9 5.0 4.6 4.8 4.8
Grade 12 142,406 148,173 145,444 159,410 161,227 3.0 3.2 3.1 3.3 3.3 4.2 4.3 4.2 4.6 4.6
Ungraded 23,489 8,672 8,118 11,783 11,422 0.5 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 11.5 4.2 6.8 10.0 8.3
                               
30 most commonly reported home
      languages of ELL students2
                             
Spanish, Castilian 3,617,597 3,577,649 3,562,860 3,718,047 3,770,816 77.2 77.0 76.9 76.7 76.5 7.5 7.4 7.4 7.7 7.7
Arabic 65,278 71,228 86,162 97,971 109,170 1.4 1.5 1.9 2.0 2.2 0.1 0.1 0.2 0.2 0.2
Chinese 77,240 80,124 96,509 104,799 107,825 1.6 1.7 2.1 2.2 2.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2
English3  86,390 77,872 85,246 90,703 91,669 1.8 1.7 1.8 1.9 1.9 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2
Vietnamese 91,607 93,204 89,536 92,560 89,705 2.0 2.0 1.9 1.9 1.8 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2
Hmong 52,990 49,697 43,845 41,368 39,860 1.1 1.1 0.9 0.9 0.8 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1
Haitian, Haitian Creole 37,074 39,736 39,883 38,768 37,371 0.8 0.9 0.9 0.8 0.8 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1
Somali 26,264 27,771 27,861 30,959 34,472 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.7 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1
Russian 34,085 33,349 32,225 33,678 33,821 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1
Korean 43,169 39,739 33,704 34,874 32,445 0.9 0.9 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1
Tagalog 38,849 37,038 32,766 35,395 32,141 0.8 0.8 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1
Urdu 20,705 21,213 22,219 22,590 22,499 0.4 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 # # # # #
French 16,525 18,504 18,849 20,018 20,799 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 # # # # #
Portuguese 18,055 15,229 15,725 17,085 19,142 0.4 0.3 0.3 0.4 0.4 # # # # #
Japanese 16,212 14,582 15,011 16,727 16,591 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 # # # # #
Panjabi, Punjabi 14,262 14,331 14,055 15,622 15,842 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 # # # # #
Bengali 10,700 11,913 14,151 15,294 15,681 0.2 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 # # # # #
Nepali 3,205 6,283 12,200 14,254 15,331 0.1 0.1 0.3 0.3 0.3 # # # # #
Burmese 7,258 9,888 12,321 12,640 13,756 0.2 0.2 0.3 0.3 0.3 # # # # #
Hindi 11,112 11,176 11,625 13,042 13,667 0.2 0.2 0.3 0.3 0.3 # # # # #
Karen languages 3,021 4,478 9,576 11,370 12,607 0.1 0.1 0.2 0.2 0.3 # # # # #
Central Khmer 14,443 13,465 11,613 11,530 12,584 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.2 0.3 # # # # #
Gujarati 9,153 9,491 10,152 10,328 10,463 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 # # # # #
Persian 8,784 8,593 8,396 9,666 9,978 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 # # # # #
German 9,605 9,898 9,274 9,190 9,642 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 # # # # #
Amharic 5,838 6,950 7,902 9,147 9,400 0.1 0.1 0.2 0.2 0.2 # # # # #
Navajo, Navaho 11,333 10,813 9,684 9,614 9,205 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 # # # # #
Polish 11,126 9,061 8,981 9,001 9,203 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 # # # # #
Armenian 8,150 7,997 7,740 8,511 8,000 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 # # # # #
Ukrainian 8,941 8,736 7,577 7,786 7,756 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 # # # # #
#Rounds to zero.
1 Includes data for California that reflect ELL students enrolled on a single date, rather than a cumulative count of all ELL students enrolled at any time during the school year.
2 Ranking of the 30 most commonly reported home languages is based on 2013-14 data. In each year shown, home language data were unavailable for approximately 92,000-133,000 students identified as English language learners. Enrollments of children speaking less common languages are not separately listed.
3 Examples of situations in which English might be reported as an English learner's home language include students who live in multilingual households and students adopted from other countries who speak English at home but also have been raised speaking another language.
NOTE: Includes all students identified as English language learners--both those participating in ELL programs and those not participating in ELL programs. Includes all ELLs enrolled at any time during the school year. Data exclude Puerto Rico and the Bureau of Indian Education. Detail may not sum to totals because grade levels were not reported for some students and because of rounding. 2010-11 not shown due to missing data.
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, EDFacts file 141, Data Group 678, extracted May 13, 2016, from the EDFacts Data Warehouse (internal U.S. Department of Education source); Common Core of Data (CCD), "State Nonfiscal Survey of Public Elementary and Secondary Education," 2008-09 through 2013-14. (This table was prepared May 2016.)

2015 Tables and Figures All Years of Tables and Figures Most Recent Full Issue of the Digest