German immersion kaput, Columbia area schools nix program as recruitment efforts fizzle

LEXINGTON — Lexington County School District One will lose its German immersion language program after unsuccessful efforts to hire teachers and recruit students into the program.

Despite pleas from advocates for the program, the Lexington One Board voted on April 11 to kill the language program.

Tamara Stemmer, who taught first grade in the language immersion program at Deerfield Elementary said faculty sensed it would go this way. “But to hear that final decision, it was very emotional,” she said.

The board’s decision leaves a similar program in Aiken County Public Schools as the only German immersion program left in the state.

Parents, students and teachers spent weeks fighting for the program and highlighting its benefits in problem-solving and memory skills, as well as the opportunities that German immersion offers graduated students in business. 

In an effort to keep the program going, district staff displayed yard signs promoting the program, distributed fliers and worked with local libraries, Chief Academic Officer Mary Gaskins said. Also, the district sent out emails, texts and social media posts, advertising open spots in the kindergarten class, she said.

But, the ongoing struggles to convince both teachers and students to join the program prompted the board to nix it.

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, in which their math and science classes each year are taught in German, and their English and Social Studies classes are taught in English. 

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.

Now, the district will stop accepting new kindergarten classes into the program beginning next school year. Students currently enrolled in the program will be able to finish through graduation. 

Low enrollment and attrition numbers are to blame for the program’s death. Twenty-eight of the 50 spots for incoming kindergartners have been filled, 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.

“It is a very unique skill set (to teach in a German immersion program),” Stemmer said. “And that’s why I do see the challenges that the program faces.”

But despite its challenges, the program’s benefits are clear. Language immersion gives students a broader understanding of the world around them, and helps students understand other cultures, Stemmer said.

Graduates of immersion programs are exponentially more likely to be fluent, and have a deeper understanding of the culture, compared to traditional language classes, said Lara Ducate, a German professor and director of the German department at the University of South Carolina.

This gives graduates a leg up in business. Germany is one of South Carolina’s largest export markets, and South Carolina is home to more than 200 German companies, including Scout Motors, a Volkswagen Group-backed automotive company that announced plans in March to open an EV plant in Blythewood.

But, the dwindling number of students and teachers invested in Lexington One’s German Immersion program proved to outweigh its benefits. 

As the German program phases out, Lexington One is looking to add a Spanish immersion program at Deerfield Elementary, Roof said. 

Reach Leah Hincks at 843-830-2555. Follow her on Twitter @LeahHincks