You might see them at your local grocery store or the library: paid petitioners asking for voters’ signatures on a proposed ballot measure that would nearly eliminate bilingual education.

By Aug. 7, organizers will try to gather the more than 63,000 signatures from across the state needed to qualify for the November election.

The campaign for English language education has local activists debating the proposal’s merits, though its impact on local school districts is uncertain.

The measure seeks to give the state’s 25,000 non-English-speaking students one year of intense English instruction before putting them into regular classes. It would virtually banish bilingual education, in which English and a child’s native language are taught concurrently.

Most non-English-speaking students in Colorado speak Spanish. Among the topics of debate about bilingual education: whether Spanish instruction will be lost, whether the method of English language education should be decided by voters and whether bilingual education students languish without making progress – which is the concern behind the proposal.

The initiative

The Colorado English for the Children initiative is backed by Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo., and was organized by a Washington, D.C.- based group called One Nation Indivisible, an organization that monitors issues affecting minority groups.

The initiative would require students to be taught English all day, every day, for one year – or until they have a working knowledge of the language. The curriculum is designed to teach students basic skills such as spelling and vocabulary. The method is known as English immersion. During the next year, the students would take regular classes with English-speaking students.

The initiative also would require all state public schools to teach in English only.

“English proficiency is a prerequisite for economic and educational opportunity in America,” said One Nation Indivisible chairman Linda Chavez, who thinks the initiative will give Hispanic children in Colorado the chance to learn English faster than does bilingual education – which can take up to seven years to build proficiency in English.

“Bilingual education’s main focus is learning the native language rather than a quick transition to English,” she said.

The initiative isn’t iron-clad. Parents can opt out of English immersion by signing a waiver that would allow their children to learn English and their native language by another method. Chavez said this would give parents more choice.

“If you are insistent that your child learn in the native language, then ask for a waiver,” she said.

Currently, there are 18 federally funded bilingual education programs across the state and six or seven district-funded bilingual programs. Denver and Boulder school districts’ programs are district- funded.

None of the school districts in the Colorado Springs area offers bilingual education. Instead, most districts use a program called English as a Second Language. The program pulls students out of regular classes for part of the day to learn English. No Spanish is taught.

Chavez explained that the initiative, which is on track to gather 100,000 signatures by the deadline, would make English immersion the primary program in schools across the state.

The opposition

A group called the Common Sense Colorado Coalition, created to oppose the English immersion initiative, also is rallying support in the Springs from civil rights groups like the NAACP and civic groups like Citizens Project.

They already have challenged the wording of the initiative in the Colorado Supreme Court. The challenge would make signatures gathered by One Nation null and void. The coalition is awaiting word on that challenge.

Fofi Mendez, campaign manager for the coalition, said the English for the Children Initiative “goes too far.”

“It doesn’t belong in the Colorado Constitution,” she said. “It will take away control from local schools without looking at the communities’ needs and parents’ choices.”

Colorado Springs City Councilman Lionel Rivera, whose first language was Spanish, agrees.

“Do we need a constitutional amendment to teach English to our students? That’s the rub,” he said. “I believe English is the language of commerce and that immigrant families would want their children to learn English, but this is a local issue.”

The coalition and others who oppose the measure say that the Spanish language, the native language of most non-English-speaking students in Colorado, will be lost if the initiative becomes law. When Mexican immigrant Martin Lucio started kindergarten in Aguilar five years ago, he didn’t know a word of English.

This summer, he moved with his family to Colorado Springs, and he’ll be a fifth-grader at Monroe Elementary in D-11 in the fall. Thanks to the English as a Second Language classes he took, the 10- year-old now knows more English than he does Spanish.

That’s frustrating to his mother, who speaks only Spanish. “It’s a little bad,” Hilda Bailon said, in Spanish. She moved to the United States from Chihuahua, Mexico, 11 years ago. “He comes from Mexico. He should at least know both languages.”

The proponents

Supporters of English immersion say that of all the non-English speakers, those from Mexico and other Spanish-dominant countries, are lagging behind when it comes to learning English.

Joseph C’de Baca, who taught in Denver public schools for 12 years, said he initially supported bilingual education.

At Hamilton Middle School, where he taught drafting and wood shop, some of his Mexican immigrant students were enrolled in bilingual education programs. But six years later, as a teacher at West High School, he saw that the same students were still in bilingual education – and not learning much English.

“Now I’m saying something’s not right here,” C’de Baca said. “Some of them were still Spanish-dominant. A large percentage are bi- illiterate. We have a meltdown here.”

Supporters say that if Hispanics want to preserve the language, then Spanish should be taught at home, as a community or by the church.

That’s how Cintia Penaloza, who will be a sophomore at Palmer High School this fall, retained her Spanish speaking and writing skills. Her parents taught her Spanish while she learned English in school. And that’s how she’ll raise her own children.

“At home, I’ll speak Spanish,” said Cintia, who is originally from Mexico City. “And then in school my children can speak English.” – Edited by Jim Borden; Headline by Andy Obermueller

What’s next

Until Aug. 7, One Nation Indivisible will continue to gather voters’ signatures in Colorado Springs and the rest of the state.

The Common Sense Colorado Coalition plans to fight One Nation’s efforts through the court and a grass-roots campaign against the initiative. The group is currently recruiting volunteers. English for the Children

If passed, Colorado’s initiative would require the state’s public schools to teach all students English “as rapidly and effectively as possible.” Students with limited English skills would be taught in an English immersion program – in which instruction in the language and all academic subjects is in English – typically lasting one year. The student then would be placed in regular classes.

Parents could waive their children’s inclusion in the program, provided they visit the school and are given a complete description of other program options.

If the initiative is placed on the ballot and approved by voters in November, Colorado would become the second state with such a measure. Voters in California passed a similar ballot measure in 1998. A ballot initiative campaign, similar to Colorado’s, is under way in Arizona.

Definitions

Bilingual education: Students with limited English skills are taught academic subjects in their native language as they gradually learn English. English immersion: Students with limited English skills receive instruction only in English. Teachers use a level of English appropriate to the students to teach English and other academic subjects. The Colorado initiative calls for “sheltered English immersion,” which allows teachers to help individual students in their native language when necessary to clarify or translate a difficult term or idea.

English as a Second Language, or ESL: Students with limited English skills typically spend part of their day learning English while also attending academic classes with native English speakers.

One Nation

One Nation Indivisible is a nonprofit lobbying agency based in Washington, D.C., and headed by Linda Chavez, director of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights under President Ronald Reagan.

The agency’s mission is to promote “color blind” equal opportunity and racial harmony, according to its Web site. It seeks to block the expansion of racial preferences and to prevent their use in employment, education and voting.

Chavez also is president of the Center for Equal Opportunity, which shares a similar mission and the same address in Washington, D.C. In previous years, the center has protested college and university admissions policies that favor minorities.

For more information about the Colorado initiative, log on to One Nation’s Web site at www.onenationindivisible.org. More information about the center is available at www.ceousa.org.

To learn more

National Clearinghouse on Bilingual Education, funded by the U.S. Department of Education. Web address: www.ncbe.gwu.edu English First, an anti-bilingual education group. Web address: www.englishfirst.org

National Association for Bilingual Education, a group supporting the instructional method. Web address: www.nabe.org

Education Week, a national journal on education issues, lists bilingual education under its “Hot Topics.” The site provides a brief overview, access to prior articles and links to other sites. Web address: www.edweek.org



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