Bellflower : Principal Selected for Limited-English School

The school board for the Bellflower Unified School District has selected a principal for the district’s new school for students with a limited ability to speak English.

Thomas Lau, a Long Beach Unified school administrator, will be the first principal of the Las Flores Newcomers’ Center. The center will occupy the site of the former elementary school at 10039 E. Palm St.

The school will serve an estimated 250 students from kindergarten through grade six for up to a year, when they will be integrated into classrooms at their home schools, spokesman Mike Pratt said. The center will accommodate native speakers of several languagues, including Spanish, Chinese, Korean and Vietnamese.

In the Long Beach district, Lau was the assistant principal at Franklin Middle School, a school in which 42% of students do not speak English fluently. Lau also spent five years as a program specialist in Long Beach’s Assignment Center, which processes non-English speakers and assigns them to programs.

Lau, who has worked as a bilingual classroom instructor, earned a master’s degree in bilingual education from Cal State Los Angeles in 1979.

“His extensive background as a bilingual educator and his sensitivity to the needs of limited-English-speaking students make him an excellent choice for this position,” Board of Education President Phyllis John said in a release. “He is just what this school needs.”