English, History on Tape for Aliens

There may be an audio-visual alternative for hundreds of thousands of amnesty applicants hoping for space in English as a second language classes.

Waiting lists for classroom instruction continue to grow, but soon lessons in English and U.S. history should be widely available on videocassettes. The Los Angeles school district and a nonprofit group are planning to distribute a new series of videotapes to help legalized aliens learn English and U.S. history in order to qualify for permanent residency.

The collection of 60 half-hour videotapes on various aspects of life in the United States will be made available at libraries, schools and churches around California starting Sept. 15, Mayor Tom Bradley and Councilman Richard Alatorre said at a Tuesday press conference.

The videotape program, called “Opportunity USA,” is produced by We The People of Los Angeles, a private nonprofit group that grew out of the city’s Commission on the U.S. Constitution.

The Los Angeles Unified School District is donating teacher time to help produce the tapes, and funding has been provided by Kaiser Permanente, Pepsi-Cola and Apple Computer Inc.

“We hope to bridge the gap between the 102,000 slots available in adult English as a second language classes and the more than 815,000 . . . aliens who must demonstrate a basic knowledge” of the language, Bradley said.

Under Phase II of the 1986 immigration law, applicants have 30 months to demonstrate proficiency in English in order to qualify for permanent residency.

Each half-hour tape in the series will feature two 30-second segments in one of five foreign languages: Spanish, Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese or Armenian. The other 29 minutes of each tape will be in English, with no subtitles or translations.

“It’s total immersion into the new language,” said Emily Chappell, executive director of “Opportunity USA.” “Many of these people cannot read and write in their own language, so to have subtitles would be just more confusing.”

Instead, the videotapes will use English sentences--repeated several times and illustrated by mimes and computer-generated graphics--to get their point across.

Chappell said some segments will teach survival skills, such as how to cash a check or use a pay phone, and others will teach social skills, such as being quiet in movie theaters and not pushing in line. She added that the videotapes are intended to show “how to get along and be accepted in society” without talking down to the audience.

“It’s always nice to have social skills mentionned to everyone, not just immigrants,” said Stewart Kwoh, executive director of the Asian Pacific American Legal Center, when the tapes were described to him.

He added that English-language videotapes without subtitles or translations may not succeed.

“The people who most need the help are people who are not English-speaking, and they will need some type of bilingual assistance,” Kwoh said. “A 30-second introduction is not going to make it.”