Save Bilingual Education

Facing Massachusetts voters in November is a ballot initiative seeking to drastically curtail bilingual education in the Commonwealth. Question 2 was proposed by Ron Unz, a California millionaire who has pursued a personal crusade against bilingual education across the country. Unz has already succeeded in persuading voters in Arizona and California to abolish bilingual programs, but he faces more opposition in Massachusetts, which has the oldest bilingual education law in the country.

Unz’s proposal would replace existing bilingual programs with a one-year crash course in English for non-native speakers. Although it is certain that Massachusetts’ bilingual education programs need significant reforms, like more skilled teachers and greater administrative support, cutting bilingual education altogether is not the answer. In fact, the programs need help not because they are too large, but rather because they are too limited for the needs of the Commonwealth. It is against the best interests of students, schools and ultimately the state to squeeze them into a one-size-fits-all program without regard for their individual needs.

It is certainly imperative that non-native speakers learn English in order to participate fully in American society. However, non-native English speakers also need to learn standard academic subjects in order to keep up with their native English speaking peers. Throwing them into math, science and social studies classes taught in English will hardly help the students learn English, and they will fall far behind in subjects where they lack the basic academic vocabulary.

Ultimately, bilingual education is the best way to integrate non-native speakers into mainstream society because they will be able to rejoin their peers in the classroom after three years at the most without being at an academic disadvantage. The ballot initiative, as proposed by Unz, will take away the resources necessary to integrate students effectively into American academic and social life and cause them to fall behind in their studies without providing the support networks necessary for them to catch up.

Of course, when students are young (K-2, for example), it makes sense to immerse non-native English speakers because teachers are still teaching the English language even to young native speakers. The problem with the ballot initiative occurs mostly in the later grades when the academic vocabulary necessary for high performance is more complicated. As a result, non-native English speakers don’t gain anything from their academic experience.

Question 2 also contains a provision to allow parents to sue teachers who “willfully and repeatedly” do not adhere to the statutes contained in the initiative. This approach fosters an unnecessarily antagonistic and adversarial relationship between parents and the school; teachers who are trying to convey information to students in the only language they understand should hardly be the targets of litigation.

Bilingual education is the best way to even the playing field between native English speakers and those who need to learn the language. Telling non-native speakers to sink or swim in classes taught in English does far more harm than good.

Dissent: Shortchanging Our Children

The Staff is correct in its long-term goal to integrate non-English speakers into the United States, but bilingual education is not the way to do so. Rapid immersion, on the other hand, gives these students the exposure to English so necessary if one is to get by, let alone prosper, in the United States today.

Bilingual education, with its specialized instruction, segregates immigrants and hampers their ultimate ability to live successfully in an English-speaking society. The quick-fix bilingual “solution” which the Staff erroneously advocates provides for an education which is separate but far from equal.

—Duncan M. Currie ’04, Anthony S.A. Freinberg ’04, Evan J. Lushing ’04, Jasmine J. Mahmoud ’04, Svetlana Y. Myerzon ’05, Paul C. Schultz ’04 and Luke Smith ’04