English as a Second Language (ESL)

Welcome to the ESL Student Support Center site. Our goal is to prepare students whose dominant language is not English to participate with confidence and success in academic college programs at Erie Community College. Through the ESL Student Support Center, we guide students in choosing courses to improve their English, math, and other academic skills. Advisement is coordinated with academic departments to place students according to interests and skill levels.

Tutors and mentors offer help in the ESL Student Lab and the Language Lab. The ESL Student Lab maintains computers and resources for student use, and the Language lab offers state-of-the-art audio-visual equipment to help students improve language skills. The ESL Student Lab staff is bilingual in English and at least one of the more than 50 languages represented at ECC.

Courses are offered for the improvement of English, math, and other academic skills. Degree credit introductory courses are also available. In addition, introductory courses where individual assistance is offered in Spanish are available for Spanish speakers. These beginning courses are useful in vocabulary and concept building and are credited, in most cases, to the program of the student’s choice. With the help of the ESL Student Support Center, students will have a rewarding experience at ECC.

ESL Placement Testing

Before being admitted to ECC, students whose first or dominant language is not English must take a test which will place them into correct classes for English and math. Testing is completed using the Accuplacer for ESL computerized placement test. Please click on the following link for the testing schedule.

Sample tests can be found: https://accuplacer.collegeboard.org/students/accuplacer-tests.