5-Year Extension Voted for Bilingual Education

With less than three weeks remaining before the state’s bilingual education program is set to expire, the Senate Education Committee on Wednesday approved legislation that would continue the controversial program for another five years.

Voting along party lines, the Democratic-controlled committee approved the measure by a vote of 6 to 3.

The bill, which has the backing of many educators and minority groups, would extend a state law requiring that school districts provide students who do not speak English with instruction in their own languages while they learn English.

Although the measure by Assembly Speaker Willie Brown (D-San Francisco) appears certain to win the approval of the Legislature, it may fall victim to a year-old battle between Democrats and Republicans over the nature of bilingual education in California.

At the urging of Assembly Republicans, Gov. George Deukmejian vetoed a similar bill by Brown last year, saying that reforms were needed in the measure. This year, he has again threatened to veto the bill, citing the need for changes in the bilingual education program.

However, Brown told reporters after the committee hearing that the Republican governor has never proposed any amendments to the bill. “He has a political problem with the bill,” Brown said. “They (Republicans) want desperately to dismantle bilingual education.”

Donna Lucas, Deukmejian’s deputy press secretary, said the governor supports bilingual education but wants school districts to have greater flexibility. However, Lipper was unable to explain. “I’m not in a position to get into any specifics because I really don’t know.”

Assembly Republicans want to give school districts the authority to reduce the scope of bilingual education and place non-English-speaking students into English-only classes more quickly.

Under the state’s existing bilingual education law, anytime there are 10 or more students in a single grade who speak a language other than English, a school must provide instruction in the students’ native language while they learn English. About 525,000 students in California are enrolled in bilingual education programs.

Brown’s bill would give school districts greater leeway to try different approaches to bilingual education, raising from 3,000 to 70,000 the number of students who could be placed in experimental bilingual programs. The measure also would require school districts to provide better notification to parents when their children are placed in bilingual programs.

In addition, Brown’s bill would give five-year extensions to several other programs scheduled to expire June 30, including programs for American Indians, children with reading difficulties, and poor, urban school districts. The state’s special education and gifted student programs, which are slated to end next year, would also receive five-year extensions under the bill.

Among the witnesses supporting the bill was 17-year-old Theoddus Devera Millan, a junior at Chula Vista High School who learned English through a bilingual education program.

Bilingual education, he told the committee, “brings people a step closer to the acceptance of one another, something which could possibly result in the end of prejudice.”

Testifying in opposition to the measure were two educators and one supporter of Proposition 63, the ballot measure approved by voters last year that declared English to be the state’s official language.

The Speaker’s bill embodies the recommendations of a state commission made up of six members appointed by Deukmejian and six appointed by the Legislature.

Alice Petrossian, a Deukmejian appointee and the chairwoman of the commission, said she and other panel members last year unanimously endorsed the bilingual bill sponsored by Brown.

“The governor must have had his reasons for it (the veto), but we would like to have had him sign it,” she said.

Petrossian, an administrator in the Glendale Unified School District, said the commission found that bilingual education was successful in teaching students English.

If the state’s bilingual education law is not extended, the program would continue under the less stringent federal law, which gives school districts greater discretion and permits them to use methods opposed by Democratic lawmakers, such as the immersion of non-English-speaking students in English-only classes.

However, some school districts, including the Los Angeles Unified School District, have indicated they will continue with their current bilingual education program even if the state law expires.