Suit filed over California district's plan to drop bilingual education

ORANGE, Calif.—A lawsuit by a coalition of Hispanic parents and civil rights groups seeks to prevent the Orange Unified School District from dismantling its traditional bilingual education program.

Earlier this month, a deadlocked state Board of Education allowed Orange Unified to proceed with its plan of replacing bilingual teaching for one year from kindergarten through third grade. The U.S. Department of Education said it will monitor the district but will not try to halt the plan.

Plaintiffs in the suit, filed Friday in Sacramento, include parents from Orange County, Los Angeles and Fresno who argue that the district’s plan could deprive students of equal educational opportunities.

“The vast percentage of migrants in California have children whom this action threatens to affect,” said Cynthia Rice, an attorney for California Rural Legal Assistance who helped prepare the case.

“If a district as large as Orange can get away with this, other districts will soon follow suit,” she said Monday.

About 2,000 of the Orange district’s 29,000 students are enrolled in the bilingual program. An additional 5,000 receive “limited English” instruction.

The district’s plan requires teachers from kindergarten through third grade to use English almost exclusively in the classroom, with some help from bilingual aides.

“After careful study, we’ve determined there is no evidence that bilingual education has been the least bit effective, anywhere in the United States, for the last 30 years, while millions of dollars have gone into it,” Superintendent Robert French said.

Local officials will have to return to Sacramento in the spring to seek permission to continue the English-only program.



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