When Araceli Orozco Muniz, 28, arrived at Carlos Rosario International Public Charter School, she wanted only to improve her English. Still relatively new to the United States, she needed a better handle on the language so she could continue working and sending money to her family in Mexico.

“Carlos Rosario changed my mind,” she said on a recent afternoon in a library on the school’s Northeast Washington campus. After taking some English classes, her teachers encouraged her to enroll in the certified nursing assistant program. It’s a common progression for students, officials said, many of whom come to learn English, then discover a career.