Bilingual Education
While school choice and annual testing received the headlines, there is another element of the Bush education plan that is equally controversial - and may ultimately be as effective in expanding educational opportunity. President Bush has previously broken ranks with fellow Republicans by voicing support for bilingual education programs that work. Yet he has also expressed concerns about some students who may be trapped in failing programs in which they are not learning English fast enough, often because students are left in bilingual programs for too long. Now, as part of his education plan, Mr. Bush has proposed requiring that schools move students with limited English proficiency into all-English classes within three years. While that is already standard operating procedure in many Texas schools, there are other states in which students may be on a bilingual track for six years or more. One of them is Arizona, where several years ago a state legislator proposed a bill that attempted to do what the Bush plan attempts now - limit to three years the time that a student may remain on a bilingual track. Amid fierce opposition from bilingual education supporters, the Arizona bill was defeated in the Legislature. Later, when the issue was put on the ballot, Arizona voters approved a more extreme measure that requires English immersion for all students after just one year. While Texans have been spared that sort of division over this issue, they have had their share of exposure to it. An estimated 32.1 percent of students in the Dallas Independent School District are now limited English proficient. That's about 55,000 students. The district is assessing its own bilingual programs to see if they are serving students as well as they ought to be. The Bush approach is reasonable, and Congress should approve the reform. It is perfectly sensible to expect that students with limited English proficiency make the transition from their native language to English, and that they do so within three years. Too often, it seems, bad programs place too little emphasis on English acquisition and too much on maintaining the student's native language. The downside is that allowing students to languish in bilingual programs may hinder their acquisition of English and limit their long-term educational achievement. That fact makes this as much a civil rights issue as an educational one. |