SPEAKING IN TONGUES

The Los Angeles School System has been forced to curtail, and even cancel in some instances, many of its regular functions due to budgetary constraints. Bilingual education is not among them. Although it is controversial, since there are no definitive answers as to its merits, it prevails in this system and precious funds must be used to sustain it.

No other large ethnic group that came to America was ever taught in this manner in the public schools even during prosperous times, and currently, Latino students are the only minority students in this city’s schools receiving bilingual education. . . .

As a veteran teacher, I recall a time when so-called Anglo students were a majority of the student population. Can you imagine the uproar if, at that time, a special educational program, or teaching technique, considered worthwhile was accorded exclusively to Anglo students and denied to the minorities?

ETHEL BARKER, SANTA MONICA