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the landslide victories of ballot measures to dismantle bilingual
education in California and Arizona, national media
coverage of the dramatic rise in subsequent test scores, and the
growing possibility of similar efforts in Colorado and New York
City, it is hardly surprising that Congress would consider inserting
bilingual-education reform into its omnibus package of federal education
legislation.
Unfortunately, it is equally unsurprising that the resulting proposal
of the IQ-challenged Republicans represents merely modifying the
color and style — and increasing the fabric cost — of
the Emperor's New Clothes.
Having fully accepted the general theory that keeping Hispanic immigrant
children in Spanish-only classes for years is the best and most
effective means of teaching them English, the Republican-controlled
Senate decided that the obvious failure of these existing programs
was caused by lack of funding. Therefore, the Senate voted 2-to-1
to quadruple federal funding for bilingual education.
Since the limiting factor in the growth of bilingual programs throughout
America has usually been the shortage of bilingual (i.e. Spanish-language)
teachers, many of these additional federal billions will likely
be spent on training and recruiting additional teachers, perhaps
from Spain and Mexico. The obvious result will be more Spanish-language
teachers, more Spanish-language classes, and fewer immigrant students
being taught English.
On the House side, fiery ultra-right-winger Tom Tancredo has courageously
championed an amendment encouraging school districts to keep Hispanic
children in Spanish-only classes for no longer than three or four
years, with a loss of up to 20% of bilingual funds being threatened
should schools fail to comply. Considering these Senate and House
provisions together means that schools that keep Hispanic students
in Spanish-only classes for four years or less will receive a 300%
boost in funding, while those that keep Hispanic students in Spanish-only
classes for (say) eight or ten years will receive merely a 220%
increase in cash. Such a harsh blow will clearly break the will
of the stubborn bilingual lobby.
Tancredo himself has been a fierce critic of current immigration
policy, and in prior years proposed eliminating all legal immigration
from Mexico and elsewhere. Perhaps the millions of immigrant children
who will remain in America's publicly funded Spanish-only classes
will take the appropriate hint, and deport themselves away, thereby
solving immigration problems.
All humor aside, the proposed three- or four-year limit on bilingual
education demonstrates a complete misunderstanding of local realities,
as proven by the many states where similar limits have already been
tried and found unworkable.
More than half of all limited-English students are American-born,
and most of the remainder arrive as young children, meaning that
the vast majority begin school in America at just five or six. Yet
most official statistics still seem to indicate that these students
have been enrolled for less than three years as late as the fourth
or fifth grade, a logical impossibility.
The reason is simple. Struggling immigrant families move often,
and students seldom stay at a given school for more than three years.
The lack of comprehensive national or statewide records thus allows
bilingual advocates to quietly restart the "clock" every time a
student enters their school. Since bilingual theorists claim that
enrollment in their programs should go on for at least five to seven
years — or perhaps even longer — many, many years of Spanish-only
classes are the almost inevitable consequence of this deceptive
three-year requirement.
In any event, younger children have a far easier time learning English
than when they grow older, and a proposed system in which they are
taught only Spanish during their early years in school, then transferred
to English classes once they can no longer easily learn that language,
helps to explain the great "mystery" of Hispanic educational underperformance
and high drop-out rate. Maintaining this system is well in keeping
with the Alice-in-Wonderland nature of so much Congressional legislation.
Although the conservative Republicans who control Washington seem
unwilling to take a stand, they are not the only elected officials
in America. For example, in liberal Massachusetts, a Democratic
state senator has now introduced legislation that would follow California's
path in replacing bilingual education with intensive English immersion.
The "English" issue seems to be reaching critical mass in the Bay
State.
Perhaps at some point in the future, Washington's right-wing Republicans
will begin to notice the powerful "English" tide in liberal bastions
such as Massachusetts and New York City, and discover the political
courage to act accordingly.
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