IMPLEMENTATION OF PROPOSITION 227
A MESSAGE TO MY COLLEAGUES
Jill Kerper
Mora, Ed.D.
San Diego State University
July 16, 1998
Dear Colleagues,
On July 15, 1998 Judge Legge denied a petition for an injunction against Proposition 227 in federal district court in San Francisco. This decision was appealed on July 23. If Legge's decision is not overturned, Proposition 227 will be fully implemented the California public schools for all school terms and semesters beginning after August 1. I have been in the forefront of the loyal opposition to 227. I want to share with you my thoughts about what is in store as we implement this new law. Passage of Proposition 227 means changes for all bilingual teachers, English teachers, administrators, teacher educators, parents and students.
A Setback for Language Minority Education
With the passage of Proposition 227, public education in California has suffered a set-back in our attempts to improve education for over 1.4 million students classified as limited in English proficiency (LEP). It is a set-back because in recent years we have made progress toward converting the compensatory education models of instruction for language minority students based on theories of linguistic, academic and cultural deficits into additive and enrichment models that view bilingualism as an asset to be nurtured and developed. This has been accomplished through well-implemented dual immersion and late-exit transitional bilingual education programs that are achieving significant results in academic achievement and language learning for thousands of students. Many exemplary programs, such as the one in the Calexico Unified School District, have documented results that have been researched by scholars and educators to establish the characteristics that make these programs successful.
As of June 2 when 227 was passed by 61% to 39% of the voters, the procedures for educating language minority students who do not speak English were spelled out by provisions of the Chacon-Moscone Bilingual Education Act of 1974. That law expired in 1987, but has continued to be implemented until now. The law required a language assessment for children whose Home Language Survey to indicate if they have limited English proficiency (LEP). If so designated, these students had to receive special language services to meet their needs. Thirty percent of these students were in programs designated bilingual education. Students were provided bilingual education or other services such as ESL or "sheltered English immersion" until they were eligible for re-designation as fluent English proficient (FEP). To be reclassified, students had to achieve a level 3 or better on a five-point proficiency scale and score in the 36th percentile in reading on a standardized achievement test. Reports last week on the results of the STAR exam indicate that in the state overall, Fluent English Proficient (FEP) students are outperforming their English-speaking peers. What this says to me is that what we have been doing in language minority education is working when we dedicate the resources and the effort to make sure that children gain proficiency in English, develop literacy skills, and learn their grade level content.
What we were doing last year and the year before to educate language minority students is not what we will be doing this fall and in the future. Proposition 227 mandates one year of sheltered English immersion or structured English immersion (SEI) before students are placed in mainstream classes. This plan is based on the English-only ideology that denounces the use of any language other than English as a medium of instruction in the public schools. classes.
A SHIFT AWAY FROM EXPERTISE
Proposition 227 shifts the responsibility for educating language-minority students onto the mainstream teachers and away from the teachers who have expertise and training in second-language acquisition, literacy and biliteracy and cultural factors in learning and academic achievement. The law does not require teachers to hold a bilingual or English language development (BCLAD or CLAD) credential to be assigned to "sheltered immersion" classrooms. Bilingual teachers will in fact be extremely reluctant to accept assignments in these classrooms because they would be placed at risk of being sued for personal liability in classrooms where students speak a native language they also speak.
The English language classrooms mandated by Proposition 227 are unlikely to produce English language proficiency and literacy skills along with content-area knowledge at grade level in only one year of instruction. Most of these children will be placed in mainstream anyway. Since these children will not be able to perform reading and writing tasks on grade level, the responsibility for providing remedial instruction for students to meet high academic standards will fall on the teachers in mainstream classrooms. This is especially true since there is no plan in the statute for evaluating the "sheltered immersion" students for program placement or exit. Students' achievement will be measured and reported by standardized test scores collectively with their English-speaking peers only after they are placed in mainstream classrooms. Consequently, mainstream teachers will be held accountable for the academic achievement of students who came to them without an adequate foundation in literacy and content.
SHELTERED IMMERSION--What is it?
First of all, we must define the term "sheltered English immersion" to understand what it is, and what it is not. The definition of sheltered immersion provided in Proposition 227 is vague and bears little relationship to what language minority educators refer to as the immersion model of second language education. Immersion programs, which are implemented extensively in Canada, are actually bilingual programs designed for students who are adding a second language in order to become bilingual. In the Canadian immersion programs, for example, native English speakers enroll to learn French. The programs generally continue for three to five years until the students become fully proficient in the target language. Over this period of time, native language instruction is gradually phased in, so usually half-way through the program, students are doing academic work in both languages with instruction time in each being 50-50%.
Immersion classrooms are taught by highly trained language teachers who are proficient in the native language of their students. These teachers are carefully selected based on their skills and their commitment to the immersion model. They use strategies whereby they interpret input from students into the second language, and provide content instruction that is modified for students' comprehension and gradual acquisition of second-language proficiency. Students are usually placed in immersion programs on a voluntary basis by their parents because they value bilingualism as a practical and academic ability that will enhance their children's opportunities culturally and professionally in the long range.
Proposition 227's Article 2:D reads as follows: "Sheltered English immersion' or 'structured English immersion' means an English language acquisition process for young children in which nearly all classroom instruction is in English but with the curriculum and presentation designed for children who are learning the language." This definition is all school districts have to go on. The law gives us two names for it, but doesn't tell us what it is so that it can be implemented. The members of the State Board spent over a half an hour in a hearing last week (July 8) arguing over whether it was more structured than sheltered and whether it should be or not.
A PSEUDONYM FOR "Sink or Swim"
It is difficult to figure out what the authors of Proposition 227 had in mind with sheltered or structured immersion. Is it a language acquisition process, a program, a technique, a method, a curriculum, a presentation or a class? Or is it just a catch-all term now adopted by the English-only movement to make the public believe there is a plan when there is not? Actually, the term sheltered immersion is just educational jargon invented to disguise the most recent version of "sink or swim."
The teaching methodology called "sheltered immersion" or "structured immersion" is terminology that combines program models and methods that not appropriate for all students regardless of their English language proficiency levels. What is termed "sheltered instruction" or SDAIE is a set of strategies for teaching academic content to limited English proficient students with levels of English at or above a level three on a five point scale. English language development or ESL strategies are used with beginning language learners, who are not expected to master content-area knowledge and reading and writing skills until their fluency levels allow for more abstract thinking and literacy learning in their second language.
So-called sheltered teaching strategies, such as SDAIE are designed for students at an intermediate fluency level. Beginning students need to be taught by a highly skilled English as a second language or bilingual teacher who is qualified in second language teaching methods and language acquisition theory. The teachers also need expertise in the complexities of second language literacy instruction.
The description from Article 2:D of Proposition 227 bears very little resemblance to the term foreign and second language educators use to describe bilingual programs that use the immersion model. This model is used to describe a bilingual education program of three to six years duration in which parents voluntarily enroll their children to become proficient in a foreign language. The program model requires highly trained and skilled bilingual teachers to teach children who are adding a second language to gain the advantages of bilingualism as an educational and economic asset.
Immersion programs are no panacea for learning a second language. The programs have attracted a rather homogeneous group of middle-class students and have not adapted well to greater cultural and linguistic diversity in enrollments. Drop-out rates from immersion programs are high, with attrition rates primary due to students' academic or behavioral problems ranging from 43% to 68% (Cummins, 1995). Many children do not fare well in immersion programs, with children of lower ability levels performing less well than students of higher ability. In the case of 227, the program is designed to only last one year--not the three to five years required in the linguistic expert's model of immersion. Nor is the native language of students phased in for instruction. Nor is the program really voluntary, since SEI is the "default mode." Parents can opt out only by applying for and being granted a "parental exception waiver" to have their child placed in another type of one-year program.
CLAD CREDENTIAL PROGRAMS
As a CLAD specialist, it is my belief that the training now in place for the teachers who would be assigned to the immersion classrooms is inadequate. These assignments would require a teacher who is highly skilled in second language teaching methodologies and in literacy and content-area instruction as well. The CLAD courses now in place are not designed to prepare teachers for this type of assignment. Nor do I believe that most mainstream teachers are adequately prepared for literacy and content-area instruction with large numbers of students with limited proficiency. The focus of teacher preparation for the CLAD has been based on the assumption that most students who need bilingual instruction would be in bilingual classrooms. The role and responsibility of the CLAD teacher would be for those students who are prepared with literacy skills in their native language to make the transition into English. These assumptions would no longer hold true under the provisions of 227. Consequently, I believe that we must begin discussions of the implications that enforcement of this law might have for our teacher education programs.
THE SCHOOL DISTRICTS' CHALLENGE
The law mandates that every one of California's 1,000 school districts must implement a curriculum that does not exist. Neither the Department of Education nor the State Board of Education has supplied school districts with a curriculum, or even any guidelines to follow, to meet the requirements of the new law. The SBOE Emergency Regulations mandates are unclear and school districts are scrambling to figure out how to implement the program. In addition, the districts have not been given time to develop a curriculum, review available materials, go through the state required adoption process, purchase new materials and train teachers to use them. Nor have they been given any money for this process. The school districts that filed amicus curi briefs with the federal court in Valeria G. vs. Wilson indicated that the purchase of new materials will cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, which they don't have in their budgets.
We do not know when or if the SBE will provide guidelines and a curriculum for the sheltered immersion program. Currently, it is being left up to each district to come up with a plan. Without an appropriate time frame for achieving its goals, and a clear definition of what those goals are and how they should be accomplished, it is unlikely that sheltered immersion will be successful.
BILINGUAL TEACHERS' DILEMMA
The reality is that many bilingual teachers find themselves faced with a professional dilemma under 227. Many of them are being expected to implement a program they cannot believe in because its underlying assumptions violate the theories and principles of effective education for language minority students. Many of them believe as I do, that they are being required to implement a pedagogically unsound educational plan. An especially troubling aspect of 227 is that parents can sue teachers for personal financial liability for "willfully and repeatedly" failing to implement the provisions of the law. It is as yet unclear what this means, but it constitutes a threat to teachers that is unprecedented and ominous. Many, I fear, will find this additional stress burdensome. Its affects on teacher morale remain to be seen. The teaching profession, and ultimately the public, will have to come to terms with the law the majority has passed and its short-term and long-term outcomes. We face difficult times ahead. I know that we will move forward with a high level of pragmatism and professionalism, for the sake of all California's children.
To navigate Dr. Mora's CLAD Website:
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