Lake Washington Institute of Technology (LWIT) will receive $136,282 through a State Board for Community and Technical Colleges grant supported by funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

One of 10 state community and technical colleges receiving the overall $3.5 million grant, LWIT will use the funds to develop open source curriculum for students in low-level English courses designed to accelerate their education toward a degree.

The Foundation funds were given in support of the State Board for Community and Technical Colleges’ (SBCTC) Integrated Digital English Acceleration (I-DEA) project grant. The program — which builds on the success of the Integrated Basic Education and Skills Training (I-BEST) initiative — creates open source curriculum for adult learners in the lowest three levels English as a Second Language (ESL) to help them complete school sooner.

“Right now we’re seeing students in ESL 1, 2 and 3 infrequently making the jump to the next ESL levels, as well as to college-level courses, due to the time and financial commitment involved,” said Doug Emory, dean of Academic Core, Hospitality, Service at LWIT. “We are aiming to change that with this grant, using the funds to develop a hybrid program that essentially gets these students working with college-level course content from day one.”

State I-BEST programs help students get through college and into the workforce sooner. Traditionally, students were required to complete all basic education and ESL courses before attending courses toward a certificate or degree.

I-BEST allows students in higher levels of ESL courses (ESL 4, 5 and 6) to take college credit courses by providing both the course instructor and an ESL instructor in the I-BEST classes. This allows the student to complete both the ESL course and the college-level course in one class.