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SANTA ANA, April 27 -- At least 12 Santa Ana schools might try to become language
alternative schools, which would exempt them from Proposition 227 and allow them to
resume some form of bilingual education. "We had schools where about three-quarters of the
parents opted for waivers," said John Palacio, Santa Ana school board president. "This is
significant enough to have a discussion on how to better respond to the community's needs.
We have to provide choices that meet the diversity in our district." But proponents of Prop.
227 say any such action would defy the will of the voters. (Orange County Register)
SACRAMENTO, April 6 -- Federal District Court Judge Edward Rafeedie gave the
Sacramento-based Pacific Legal Foundation the "green light" to enter into a lawsuit, pending
in his courtroom, to defend the parent enforcement mechanism of California's Proposition
227. PLF, which thus far has succeeded in defending the initiative in a separate court case,
sought to intervene in a new lawsuit recently filed by the California Teachers Association
and other groups who are challenging a section of Proposition 227 that gives parents and
guardians a private right of action to enforce the measure. Under Section 320 of the
initiative, parents may hold teachers, administrators, and school board members personally
liable for damages and attorneys fees if they willfully and repeatedly do not provide an
English language option to students of limited-English ability (California Teachers
Association v. Davis.) "Public school teachers and administrators have no right of 'academic
freedom' to nullify the will of the people who enacted Proposition 227," said PLF's Sharon L.
Browne who is acting on behalf of parents and guardians of limited-English-proficient
students and the Washington D.C.-based Center for Equal Opportunity, an organization that
conducts research into, and is critical of, bilingual education. In another case PLF is
opposing efforts by several Bay Area school districts to obtain waivers from complying with
Proposition 227 so that they can continue their existing bilingual education programs
(McLaughlin v. California State Board of Education.) (Business Wire)
OAKLAND, Calif. April 5 -- First graders in Angela Allen's class at Manzanita Elementary
School here learn their numbers from a brightly colored banner. On it, the words uno, dos,
tres are printed under the numerals 1, 2, and 3. Alphabet charts lining the classroom walls
remind students that A is for amigo, B for bueno, and C for casa. Kids take turns reading
aloud from essays they've written in their native Spanish. Despite the broken heating
system, Allen's classroom is warm and lively. But the emphasis on Spanish seems a far cry
from what California voters had in mind last June when they resoundingly passed
Proposition 227, a controversial initiative intended to end bilingual education. The measure
says that "all children in California public schools shall be taught English by being taught in
English." Prop. 227 requires non-English-speaking students to take classes in which
"nearly all" instruction is in English, taught at a slower pace. The theory goes that the kids
will be fluent enough after a year in English "immersion" programs to switch into regular
classes. But Prop. 227 hasn't been the death knell that both fans and foes predicted. Many
students are learning far more in English than in the past. But tens of thousands of others,
like Allen's pupils, still study reading, writing, math, and science in Spanish, the native
language of 80 percent of California's 1.4 million schoolchildren with limited English
skills. Those classes are accompanied by an hour or so of daily English lessons. "The idea is
that while they're learning English, they shouldn't be stopped from learning other
subjects," says Allen, summing up the theory behind bilingual ed.(US News and World
Report)
