The Pros and Cons of Bilingual Education

Bilingual education is a "hot" issue in California, so much so that Pro. 227 in 1998 put the issue of bi-lingual education up to the voters. The so-called Umz Initiative against bi-lingual education passed by a margin of 61% to 39%. However, there continue to be those who believe it is necessary, at least temporarily, to bring foreign-born students up to speed, while the opponents claim that English should be the national language, and until children are proficient in English, their ability to drop back to speaking another language hinders the overall learning process. These people are not against education for all, but insist that the education be in English. This would then mean some sort of remedial schools or classrooms where foreign-language students would be taught English before they become part of the rest of the school's curriculum. Nevertheless, given the influx of immigrants whose children are of school age but speak little or no English, education cannot be denied to them. Bilingual education continues to be necessary so children can learn, regardless of the language they speak at home or with which they grew up.

Pro:

Part of the problem both with bilingual education and English-as-a-second-language instruction in the United States lies in our unwillingness to treat English for non-speakers as an academic subject. Schools often treat (limited-English-proficient) students as a...group of helpless individuals, in need of a warm, fuzzy environment created by caring or undemanding teachers... Bilingual Education should be repaired, not replaced. Bilingual programs would do well to provide long periods of total English immersion as well as opportunities to interact with native speakers. Both bilingual and immersion programs should be held to accountability standards.