Bilingual Education
Editorial
The early test-score dividends California is reaping from its decision to eliminate bilingual education send a welcome message that common-sense, grass-roots school reform can work. And surely it's common sense to minimize any delay in the teaching of English to U.S. children who haven't been raised with that language as their native tongue. For many years in California, where many students speak Spanish in the home, bilingual education instead extended that delay - and extended a needless postponement in the academic advancement of those non-English-speaking students. Fortunately, fresh evidence now confirms what should have been obvious - and refutes the alarming warnings of so-called experts who insisted that ending bilingual education would have detrimental results. As The Wall Street Journal reported this week, standardized test scores for students with previously limited English skills have risen by more than 40 percent in reading and 40 percent in math in the two years since California voters dumped bilingual education in a lopsided referendum - Proposition 227. Unfortunately, many entrenched interests in the education establishment persist in defending bilingual education, often in the name of multi-culturalism. U.S. Education Secretary Richard Riley, former South Carolina governor, said earlier this year: "In some places, even the idea of bilingual education is controversial. It shouldn't be." Secretary Riley should review the California test results, and reconsider his drive to create 1,000 new "dual language" schools in the next five years. Though "dual language" improves a bit on bilingual education by using more language-immersion techniques, it still splits instructional time between English and the student's first language. A non-English-speaking student's first priority should be to master this nation's primary language - as it generally has been throughout U.S. history until this recent misguided detour into bilingual education. That doesn't mean Spanish-speaking students shouldn't develop their abilities in that language. English-speaking students should learn other languages, too. But if cultural assimilation and academic objectives are to be achieved, U.S. students should make English their main school language - not a "dual language." And as California voters learned, the younger they start, the better. |