Bilingual ed reports
Bilingual education is one of those things like the federal government's program of farm subsidies: Most people probably have opinions about it pro or con and few feel the need to get more facts. For those who do need more facts to come to conclusions about what we believe is a misguided and failed attempt to boost achievement of immigrant children, a Virginia think tank has assembled some devastating examples from reports that Massachusetts school systems are required to file on their use of federal aid for special bilingual programs. Even defenders of the state's current bilingual programs could benefit from a look into the report, "Federal Bilingual Education Programs in Massachusetts: 'But Do They Help the Children?' " published by the Lexington Institute of Arlington, Va. (www.lexingtoninstitute.org.) Defenders of current bilingual practice usually say children should be able to transfer to instruction in English in three years, though they do not dispute that many in fact are staying in bilingual programs longer. Lexington found one program in Boston that could send only 9 percent of its students on. Out of 14 federally aided programs studied in Boston, Springfield, Worcester, Lowell, Cambridge and Salem, the best transition rate was found in Worcester, 24 percent. Salem officials made no report because they judged the rate not relevant. Among other interesting facts: - In Worcester, only 10 out of 58 "English learners" in one program were judged "competent English readers" after the fourth year. - In Springfield, one program covering three schools found reading scores declining in both English and Spanish (from "pre-test" to "post-test") over the course of the fifth grade for English learners in two of the three schools. - A program for 45 Chinese-American students at the Clarence Edwards Middle School in Boston included student clubs in Chinese folk dance, Chinese yo-yo, African-American step dancing, palm reading and Tai Chi that meet, school officials complained, at times that "regularly disrupt classes." No indicators of academic performance were reported, such as test scores. - Teachers, administrators and others in a Cambridge program ("AMIGOS," a "two-way Spanish-English immersion program" which enrolled students whose home languages were English, Spanish, Portugese, Mandarin and Haitian Creole) managed to travel to New York, Denver, Providence, Dallas, San Antonio, Albuquerque, San Francisco, Santa Barbara, Calif.; Monterrey, Calif.; Charlotte, N.C.; Montreal, Toronto, and unspecified cities in Tennessee, Puerto Rico and Spain, a record which probably makes the free-loaders in some Massachusetts state government agencies green with envy - even if it did take 11 years to compile. California entrepreneur Ron Unz, whose "English for the Children" movement produced major increases in test scores there after the voter referendum it backed largely abolished the old way of doing bilingual education, is now supporting an effort to do the same via the ballot in Massachusetts. All who support high achievement by all students regardless of background should be in his corner. |