LEXINGTON — A Lexington School District One German immersion learning program could be on the chopping block, as efforts to recruit and retain teachers and students have flopped. 

Amid pleas from teachers, parents and students to keep the program alive, the Lexington School District One Board will vote next month whether to cut the language program as students and teachers dwindle. 

If the board decides to end the offering, a similar one in Aiken County Public Schools will be the only German immersion program left in the state.

Stakeholders in the program have called on the board to consider the immersion benefits. 

“The program has not only provided my child with enhanced problem-solving skills, improved memory and attention, but also exposed him to a different culture, creating a more culturally open-minded student,” said Michelle Yandle, a parent of a German Immersion student at Deerfield Elementary.

Additionally, German immersion programs can set students up for unique business opportunities later in life, said Lara Ducate, a German professor and director of the German department at the University of South Carolina.

Lexington One’s German immersion program started at Deerfield Elementary in 2014. Students entering Kindergarten at Deerfield have the option to enroll in a German immersion education, where each year their math and science classes are taught in German, and their English and Social Studies classes are taught in English. 

If the board votes to cut the German immersion program, Deerfield Elementary will stop accepting new students, but currently enrolled classes will be able to finish through 12th grade.

Deerfield Elementary also offers a Spanish immersion program. Centerville, Gilbert, Meadow Glen, Midway, Pleasant Hill, Red Bank elementary schools also offer immersion programs in either Spanish, Mandarin Chinese or French.

In theory, each year a cohort, two classes of 25, learns half in German and half in English through Pleasant Hill Middle School and Lexington High School. 

However, low enrollment and attrition numbers have put the program at risk. Right now, 28 of the 50 spots for incoming kindergartners have been filled, Chief Academic Officer Mary Gaskins told the board in a March 21 meeting. Currently, 30 students are in the program’s sixth, seventh and eighth grade classes combined, said Lexington One Spokeswoman Libby Roof.

District staff are also struggling to fill German immersion teaching vacancies.

“I think education is just a hard sell right now,” Ducate said. “German was already kind of slower than the other languages.”

Still, teachers, students and parents involved with the program have contacted district staff and board members at meetings and privately to outline the German immersion program’s benefits and propose solutions to its challenges. 

“For immersion students that arrive in the high school, the core trait that sets them apart is confidence,” said Lexington High School German Teacher Clay Hendrix. “They blow through those mistakes, and that kind of confidence is what you need to … master a language over the course of your life”

Learning German offers students a unique advantage in the workforce, Ducate said.

South Carolina is home to facilities of more than 200 German companies, including Scout Motors, a Volkswagen Group-backed automotive company that announced plans this month to open an EV plant in Blythewood. 

“A German company would be more likely to hire someone who knows German and is familiar with the culture than someone who isn’t,” Ducate said.

Additionally, Germany is one of South Carolina’s largest export markets, which gives German speakers a leg up in business, she said. 

Students who study in immersion programs, compared to traditional language classes, are exponentially more likely to be fluent, and have a deeper understanding of the culture, Ducate said. 

For these reasons, Lexington One staff has worked to keep the German immersion program afloat. In addition to extending the registration deadline for incoming Kindergartners until April 7, staff has displayed yard signs promoting the program, distributed fliers and worked with local libraries, Gaskins said. Also, the district has sent out emails, texts and social media posts advertising open spots in the Kindergarten class, she said. 

To recruit teachers, Lexington One officials are working with national and international networks to find German teachers, Gaskins said. 

The Lexington One Board will decide on April 11 whether to keep the German Immersion program around, if enrollment does not see a boost in the coming weeks.