Immigrant students in Malta and the language barrier

Abstract

The immigrant students' entry in local State Schools is inevitably affecting the fabric of Maltese classrooms changing and challenging them in several ways. This multiple case study explored the immigrant students' language-mediated experiences in State Secondary Schools. It documented the language provisions for immigrant students provided by the receiving schools in a bid to analyse these language programmes and how they were received by the immigrant students. Three State Secondary Schools were chosen as cases and data collected via non-participant classroom observations, face-to-face semi-structured interviews with immigrant students, members of their respective school's Senior Management Team, subject teachers, and various experts on education and immigration. Findings indicated that when the immigrant students entered Secondary Education in Malta, they all faced various challenges accentuated particularly by a language barrier. An initial temporary survival kit for immigrant students was the English language, however, as the immigrant students spent more time at school, a stronger barrier emerged - that of the Maltese language. Without this, the immigrant students felt trapped in an invisible bubble, battling with school routines and unable to access the curriculum and their daily routines at school. Moreover, the various shortcomings in the language provisions provided by the schools in the absence of a national policy fuelled issues of inequity and hindered the immigrant students' access to quality education. Recommendations are made for a national policy to address the language needs of the immigrant students in which Maltese as an Additional Language will be recognised as a subject. In acknowledging the immigrant students' diverse language needs and providing them with adequate language provisions, the immigrant students will be able to access a quality education.