Recently in the Arizona Republic, writer Daniel Gonzalez opposed Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne quite passionately in his article “Best Way to Learn English? New Threat to Dual Language Programs” (June 11, 2023).
Gonzalez believes that Arizona should eliminate the English immersion law, based on Proposition 203, passed by 63 percent of Arizona voters in 2000. It mandates that English learners, children who enter our schools not able to communicate in English, learn English by being taught in English exclusively until they have reached English proficiency.
Presently, in spite of this law, many schools offer dual language programs that provide the English learners with native language instruction, which is almost always Spanish, during 50 to 80 percent of the school day. Horne’s enforcement of the English immersion law would eliminate such programs.
Gonzalez praised William C. Jack School in the Glendale Elementary School District for its dual language program where regular English-dominant students are taught together with Spanish-dominate English learners. One teacher instructs totally in English for half the school day; a second teacher, totally in Spanish for the other half.
According to U.S. News, only 27 percent of the students at William Jack School reached proficiency in reading on the 2021 state test. Great Schools at www.greatschools.org considers this school to be failing its students and even suggests on its website that parents look for schools in the area with better achievement results. Other schools with dual language programs that involve Spanish-dominant English learners have had similar results.
Few teachers in U.S. district schools speak a second language other than Spanish. Thus, they cannot instruct students from Viet Nam, Ethiopia, Bosnia and other countries in their native languages. Out of necessity, those students are immersed in English and outperform the Spanish-speakers except in schools where all of the English learners receive 100% of their instruction in English.
The state data from the U.S. Department of Education show that the three states that had passed the English immersion initiatives (CA, AZ, and MA) in the early 2000s experienced measurable improvement within a few years – especially when compared to the states that rejected the initiatives, Colorado and New York.
From 2007-2015, 33 percent of English learners in California achieved English proficiency on average, in contrast to the previous 5 percent average. Moreover, California’s monitored former English learners who had been reclassified from 2007-2015 scored 62.1 on average in reading, outscoring all CA students who averaged 59.2 percent. They outscored all students by nearly 6 percentage points in math (61 percent, compared to 55.1 percent).
During that same period, 29 percent of Arizona English learners on average became English proficient – a jump from their previous 4 percent average. The reclassified former English learners scored 65 percent in reading versus 70 percent for all students and scored 55 percent in math versus 60 percent for all students.
While serving on the Maricopa County Community College District Governing Board (from January 2015 to the end of 2018), I was impressed to discover that students who had identified themselves as having grown up in Spanish-speaking homes, most likely registered as “English learners” in district schools, were measuring up quite impressively to white students according to their retention and college-level success rates – closing the achievement gap to only 3 and 5 percentage points respectively.
In Massachusetts, from 2007-2015, 34 percent of English learners in federal programs and 31 percent of all MA English learners had become proficient in English.
In both Colorado and Massachusetts, where the English immersion law had been rejected, the outcomes from 2007-2015 for English learners, overwhelmingly Spanish-speakers, were dismally low. In Colorado, only 17 percent of English learners had reached English proficiency on average; in New York, only 16 percent had made the mark.
As a person who has become fluent in several languages himself, State Superintendent Tom Horne understands the issue fully and supports the law that provides the best option for Arizona English learners.
Sadly, writer Daniel Gonzalez has allowed himself to be influenced by propaganda from people who stand to profit in some way by denying Spanish-dominant children the opportunity to become fully proficient in English.
Johanna Haver is author of Vindicated: Closing the Hispanic Achievement Gap through English Immersion (Rowman & Littlefield, 2018).