Schools Are Failing All Students

As a first-grade bilingual education teacher, Korean immigrant and product of public schools in the U.S., I am very disturbed by the proposal to eliminate bilingual education in California.

Because of the shortage of bilingual teachers, fewer than 30% of the 1.4 million limited English proficient students in California are actually enrolled in bilingual programs. This means that most students are already in English-only classrooms like those proposed by Ron Unz, the author of Proposition 227. Proponents of 227 claim that these children are failing to learn English in bilingual programs, when in reality, the majority are already taught exclusively in English. Could this be the reason why they are failing?

Bilingual education has not failed to teach students English, but rather we as voters, taxpayers and as a society have failed to provide a quality education for all of our students, those with limited English and native English speakers. Proposition 227 does not address the fact that as we approach the year 2000, nearly one out of every five people in the U.S. are functionally illiterate, two-thirds of those being native English speakers and most of those being white.

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Young Im Yoo teaches at Cahuenga Elementary School in Los Angeles.