The Commissioner of Education for Rhode Island and her staff recently visited two schools in #MiddletownRI and came away impressed with the district's work for Multilingual Learners - and all students.
STATE EDUCATION OFFICIALS VISIT LOCAL SCHOOLS, IMPRESSED
MIDDLETOWN, RI (APRIL 21, 2025) – Rhode Island Department of Education Commissioner Angelica Infante-Green visited Middletown High and Aquidneck schools recently.
And from all indications, the state’s top educator and others came away extremely impressed with the work supporting Multilingual Learners (MLL) — and all students — across the district.
Superintendent Billy Niemeyer and School Committee Chair Gregory Huet thanked everyone involved for helping turn a longstanding weakness for Middletown schools into a source of strength.
While agreeing there’s more work to be done, they said it was good to know the work was paying off, especially for each of the community’s students.
“When people think about Middletown, Rhode Island, they generally don’t think about a large MLL population, but that’s definitely the reality here,” Niemeyer said. “I can’t say enough to our educators and the School Committee for making this a point of emphasis for us, getting these students and all our students the supports they need to thrive in today’s environment.”
“I’m very proud of the work we’ve accomplished with our Multilingual Learners and our student population in general,” Huet said. “All the credit really goes to our teachers and administrators who’ve identified what we need to do and made it a reality in short order. We’re definitely moving in the right direction with all our schools.”
Coming from schools in Providence before he was hired as the principal at Gaudet Middle School, Niemeyer said he’s familiar with working with large MLL populations.
He said historically, suburban schools like Middletown struggle to meet the needs of their MLL students. Many do not have the resources, awareness or interest to focus on the nuances of educating MLL learners, a challenge across the nation.
Currently, the district has more than 200 MLL students, meaning about one in 10 students is a non-English speaker. The local MLL population represents 29 countries and 18 different languages. Data shows the Top 6 non-English languages spoken in Middletown schools are Spanish, Portuguese, Arabic, Malay, Bahasa and Japanese.
Aware of those figures even before he took the Gaudet job, Niemeyer said the district has set an even more aggressive approach towards helping MLL students under the direction of the School Committee since he took over as superintendent a year ago.
Part of that was building on a strong foundation by developing more MLL educators as well as the Middletown Multilingual Collaborative.
Megan Mainzer, Director of Family and Community Engagement was put in charge of creating the Multilingual Collaborative with Ana Gomes, Marisa Portillo and Jamoya Ridgell.
Silvia Lima was recently added as the district’s Coordinator of MLL to assist with teaching and learning for that student population.
The Multilingual Collaborative has held a number of community events centered around increasing family participation in school and collaborative activities to grow the connections to services for MLL students and their families.
"We designed a five-year plan,” Mainzer said. “Our main goal was to ensure that Middletown was a place where MLL students could access quality education, become career and college ready and build a strong network of school, family and community working together.”
Assistant Superintendent Michelle Fonseca applauded everyone involved for their drive to improve — for all students.
“We knew we had to do better. Our population in Middletown has changed, and as educators we must change,” Fonseca said. “The commissioner was able to gain a peek into the hard work of our district.
“Our teachers have embraced learning how to best instruct our multilingual learners. Our entire district has learned how to be more welcoming to multilingual students and families. We are not finished, but we are so proud of the willingness and effort our entire Middletown community has shown.”
Through these combined efforts, the district now has 12 certified MLL educators and 52 percent of all teachers with their Rhode Island School of Progressive Education MLL endorsement.
The Island Oasis food pantry was also established to help those in need, with close to 26,000 meals served to date. The Island Oasis was created in 2023 through a partnership with the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Community Center in Newport, which provides all the food to support the local food pantry.
Proud of the district’s accomplishments over a relatively short period, Niemeyer said he mentioned all the good that was happening to Infante-Green in passing one day.
That led to a visit by the commissioner and a number of her high-level cabinet members on April 4.
The group began with a visit to the Island Oasis for coffee and local pastries while Middletown officials shared today’s realities for the district.
“Historically, we served War College students, who oftentimes spoke some English, come from educated affluent households and their visit was more like a cultural exchange,” Niemeyer said. “They did receive support to learn English, but kids returned home after a year, generally. Now, Middletown is shifting to a more MLL population, primarily Central American, and Brazilian, although we have kids from all over the world.”
“We talked about our focus being the high school, as we know students arriving later in their educational career often are not successful,” Niemeyer added. “We see that in our data. They may arrive unaccompanied, they may arrive with interrupted schooling, and they arrive with little to no English skills, making accessing our curriculum difficult. We’re working hard to make sure we offer all the supports we reasonably can.”
A partnership with the van Beuren Charitable Foundation was also the source of much discussion. Through work with the Newport-based nonprofit, the aim has been to create a “collaborative” effort and sense of community and belonging for MLL students — and in the community in general.
There was discussion about the partnership between the Middletown schools and the Center for Youth and Community Leadership in Education (CYCLE) at Roger Williams University to work with a group of nine students who are multilingual learners.
The goal of this project was to engage and train youth in a research process to share their experiences as multilingual learners in the district and surface needs and opportunities to better serve this student population. Out of focus groups, MLL students were encouraged to develop their own voice and share their experiences to help make positive changes in the district.
Middletown High Principal Donna Sweet said she felt immense pride in the students and her staff from the visit.
“There was an overwhelming sense of collaboration and pride among all stakeholders, Sweet said. “Students, donning their Multilingual Collaborative shirts, shared openly about their experiences in Middletown and the support and changes they see in place.”
Sweet said much of this work has occurred over time through the Mainzer’s leadership along with grant funding as well as support from the School Committee and the Central Office.
“The result has been the addition of critical resources,” Sweet said. “We have increased our staffing at MHS with the addition of Ms. (Tara) Mellow who works with Mr. (Luis) Oliveira to give English language instruction and to push into classrooms. Key conversations have also occurred and it all has helped to build a sense of community. The result everyone saw (on April 4) was an emotional and genuine reaction from parents, teacher and students. The Commissioner was very impressed by the visit and even moved to tears of joy of the work at MPS. She spoke to students in their native language. It was a prideful day.”
“It was so powerful to share with the Commissioner how much change we have achieved in the first year of our five-year plan,” Mainzer added. “She was able to hear from MLL parents, students and community members who have all been positively impacted by our commitment to making things better. The sense of community and collaboration in Middletown is growing and that is a testament to our team building relationships and trust. I feel really proud of our team and the work we have done in just one year.”
Class of 2027 member Carlos Reyes agreed, saying he’s felt more than welcome at Middletown High.
“I have seen so much support from the teachers as well as the rest of the students who try to help other students succeed in their classes by helping them when needed,” Carlos said. “I would also like to add that all this has been made possible thanks to Mrs. Sweet’s support and caring.”
Next, the group stopped in at Aquidneck School, where Niemeyer said 100 percent of the teaching staff have taken advantage of a district initiative and achieved an MLL endorsement.
“This was done in addition to their teaching licenses and it was a lot of hard work,” Niemeyer said. “These educators took the time out to make this happen and with the new RIDE MLL regulations coming out in the next year or so, Middletown is ahead of the curve and set to be a leader in the state. It also ensures that they have the understanding and the skills to support the MLL students in their classes, allowing kids to access the content.”
“The commissioner was astounded that 100 percent of the Aquidneck staff was endorsed,” Niemeyer continued. “We did this by securing grant funding and promoting coursework to our teachers that will get them this certification. We also paid them a stipend for this work, from the grant. We prioritized this as a weakness for our district, and have turned it into a positive. It’s all part of our concerted effort with our schools. We have to do better and we’re taking strides in that direction.”
Niemeyer said it was important to note that was the goal for all Middletown schools — to make a positive difference in the lives of every student.
“When we were at Aquidneck, we went to visit a handful of classes to watch our teachers in action,” Niemeyer said. “It was awesome. Kids, MLL or not, were engaged. Teachers were employing strategies that are beneficial to all students. This is an important part of our push — the strategies that teachers are learning benefit ALL students. This work is not just for MLL students, it benefits all of the kids in Middletown.”
Document Link: https://mdl.town/NYCU-MLL
About Middletown
The Town of Middletown is a vibrant community located on Aquidneck Island, known for its scenic beauty, historic landmarks, diverse economy and strong sense of community. For more information about all we have to offer, visit MiddletownRI.gov online.
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