TJuani Bell Marks started a school after living abroad and encountering huge language barriers while navigating everyday life. Realizing how hard it was for her, she wanted to make sure that her son didn’t face those same challenges.

“We wanted more for our son than we had for ourselves,” Marks stated.

The Omni International School opened its doors to students in 2012. Housed in a church in Atlanta, the 55-student school is working to make sure that their attendees break down language barriers. Starting with students at the age of 2, they’ve added a grade level yearly to allow all of their students to advance. They hope to continue to do so.

Students are immersed in learning English and Spanish, then choose either Chinese or Japanese. Marks’ son Lawrence, age 10, has already mastered two languages and is working on his third.

“Research shows that 0 to age 10 is the time that you should saturate children in languages,” Marks said. “Our students are learning languages at such a younger age than they would normally, and they are becoming fluent.” All foreign language classes are taught by native speakers, which allows students to learn the languages with close to perfect diction.

Omni International School not only excels in immersing their students in foreign languages, but also in standardized testing through a unique strategy of placing students in grades based on ability instead of age.

With a strong support system of parents who hold master’s and doctorate degrees themselves, the Omni International School shows no signs of slowing down. Although this program is hard to replicate in our currently under-funded charter and public schools, perhaps the success of Omni might inspire similar programs so that more students can take advantage of this amazing opportunity.

What do you think? How can we get more students immersed in language learning?

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