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Happy New Year.
Editor’s Note:
The next governor of Oregon needs to use their bully pulpit to expand the state’s dual-language immersion programs.
Our state’s demographic destiny includes lingual diversity: Nearly 14% of younger Oregonians speak Spanish and that number is only going to increase according to the Migration Policy Institute. Whether that diversity makes Oregon a more prosperous and communal place remains an open question.
Our answer, led by the next governor, should involve giving all Oregon students the gift of language, so they can circumvent cultural barriers, break professional glass ceilings and shatter the supremacy of English-only education.
Students in DLI programs receive education in two languages beginning as early as kindergarten. This curriculum results in three important outcomes based on RAND’s analysis of a DLI program in Portland Public Schools.
First, students learning English for the first time do better academically when enrolled in DLI programs. As Oregon strives to welcome businesses and families from around the world, the availability of DLI programs will attract companies and parents alike.
Second, students already exposed to English before starting school also perform better academically. What’s more, these academic improvements are long-lasting — DLI participants score higher on tests across subjects.
Third, students in DLI programs retain proficiency in both languages into their adolescent years, setting them up for more opportunities in high school and beyond.
A particularly effective combination of languages for Oregon students is English and Spanish.
Since 2000, the state’s Latino population has grown by 72% and now totals 12% of all Oregonians, according to the Oregon Community Foundation. This group of Oregonians is younger than the state’s white population: The median Latino age is 24 years old; the median white Oregonian is 41 years old. The prevalence of Latinos occurs in Oregon’s schools, too. Almost 25% of Oregon’s K-12 students are Latino.
Our English-only approach to education fails current students and thwarts us from realizing the individual and societal benefits associated with bringing Spanish into classrooms. As early as kindergarten, Latino students rank behind their white peers in literacy. By third and eighth grade, state test scores reveal that Latino students have fallen further behind. When high school graduation comes around, just 75% of Latino students graduate, far short of the 84% graduation rate of white students.
Switching to DLI programs will not erase the educational attainment differences between races and ethnicities in Oregon. However, it’s a start. Literacy in English is fundamental to economic and social success. Literacy in another language is essential to having an upper hand in a dynamic economic age. Across the EU, six in 10 students learn a second language; in Norway, every single student does so.
Certain states are picking up on the economic and cultural benefits of DLI programs. Utah, North Carolina, Delaware and New York all have invested in such programs in recent years. Students in these states will see benefits in the classroom that translate into career success: proficiency in other languages increases salaries by 3% to 7%.
DLI programs not only will help Latino students catch up economically and academically but also will generate tremendous societal benefits. Local, county and state governments can more easily respond to requests for materials in different languages. Nonprofits and other community organizations can source from a broader pool of volunteers when seeking assistance with non-English-speaking community members. Finally, our culture can become much richer as we explore ideas and opportunities previously unavailable to an English-biased approach.
It’s true many students are already required to take a second language during their K-12 education. These language courses are too late and too short. They’re too late because by 11 years old the centers in the brain responsible for language acquisition experience much slower growth and language acquisition becomes much harder. They’re too short because they're not immersive, a key element of language adoption.
My six years of Spanish (two in middle school and four in high school) would leave me in the bus station if dropped in the middle of Mexico City (actually, I could make it to the library — biblioteca — but then I’d be stuck).
Scaling and supporting DLI programs across the state will not be easy. There’s already a shortage of young folks entering the teaching profession. As the state works to recruit teachers with the ability to run DLI classrooms, an interim step should be to welcome community members into our classrooms. This isn’t a perfect solution, but it will get Oregon going on an important path toward greater lingual diversity, widespread literacy and general economic success. That’s precisely why candidates for governor should study and champion this issue.
Here’s to a better Oregon,
Kevin
This piece originally ran in the Register Guard. Read it here.
To look forward to:
Our #GovernorGoals series. Learn more about how you can help shape the future of our state here.
January will focus on homelessness and include posts from Mayor Stan Pulliam, former Bend Mayor Jeff Eager, Jessica Gomez, and more.
Nathan Howard shares his perspective on Measure 109 and what it will mean for Oregonians both now and well into the future.
To interpret:
To read:
Cyreena Boston Ashby reflects on her early 2021 post about likely racial disparities in vaccination rates. With those predictions coming to fruition, Cyreena calls for continued investment in public health.
Read more here.
Jeff Allen responds to Sarah Iannarone’s transportation piece and makes the case for electrifying cars as part of a better transit system.
Read more here.
Tim Nesbitt looks back at his own piece on electric vehicles and reveals one case study of how a novel solution may scale.
Read more here.
David Frank examines Kevin Frazier’s editor note from December 17, 2021 and dives deeper into the importance of thick tolerance.
Read more here.
Xavier Stickler urges Oregon’s leaders to shun failed solutions such as building more lanes and to instead use their imaginations to build the Interstate Bridge the region deserves.
Read more here.
Jared Garson points out that many recyclable materials aren’t ending up where they should because of changes in Asia. He calls for more efforts to make recycling more expansive and available in Oregon and the U.S.
Read more here.
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Photo credit: "20181206-FS-WashingtonDC-CMR-460" by Forest Service Photography is licensed under CC PDM 1.0