Some advocates have claimed that bilingual education would be gutted by the new budget of Boston School Superintendent Thomas Payzant going before the School Committee tonight. In fact, it would barely be touched.

And therein lies the problem. No school committee in the state has much discretion in this exercise in ethnic separatism. State and federal law and regulations control just about everything.

The budget calls for staff cuts because the number of pupils is decreasing. There are fewer coming in, they tend to be younger than before and tend to move into regular English classes sooner. The fact that the system needs 28 fewer bilingual teachers (it will still have 517) ought not to be treated as bad news.

Payzant plans to appoint a committee to review bilingual education, to report in September.

The committee will do the city a service if it calls for a thorough revision of state law to throw out the current requirements for “transitional” bilingual education (in which subjects like history and math are tought in the foreign language) in favor of “English immersion,” which puts students in regular classes almost from the start, with special help.

Polls show that four out of five immigrant parents want their children in regular classes as soon as possible as the best possible way to start making a new life in a new country. The current system frustrates their hopes.



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