Thread: Bilingual Texts Bill a Smokescreen (Opinion)

http://www.whittierdailynews.com/opinions/ci_3393338
Article Launched: 01/12/2006

Bilingual texts bill a smokescreen

IN grading her political career, we've often given state Sen. Martha Escutia, D-Norwalk, high marks. Especially impressive was her six-year drive to jetison junk food from schools. But her third try to reinstate bilingual textbooks under the guise of local control ought to meet with the same fate as her first two tries: A big "noway" from the governor.

Senate Bill 696 is basically 2005's SB 657, which was essentially 2004's SB 1380. All would allow school districts to adopt textbooks that haven't been approved for use by the state and may or may not meet tough state academic standards. Surely, Escutia can't really mean to roll back the impressive gains school districts and their students have made since the institution of academic standards and progress reports under Gov. Gray Davis.

Perhaps she's simply giving the nod to some educrats who love the notion of returning to a time when they wrote and chose textbooks. But parents who remember the emphasis on self-esteem above academics, fuzzy math and whole language that sought to teach reading by way of osmosis through exposure to language, wouldn't be too thrilled to return to those days when students were guinea pigs for untried teaching methods.

More likely, Escutia is simply again trying a backdoor approach to putting more bilingual texts into the hands of children who should be learning English - as quickly as possible. More textbooks, more teachers, that's what bilingual education will again bring.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger had the good sense to veto Escutia's first two attempts at usurping the state ed board's role in curriculum and textbook selection.

Schwarzenegger's veto message to last year's SB 657 was direct and to the point: "I vetoed a similar bill last year, SB 1380 (Escutia) because it was inconsistent with the State Board of Education's principles to ensure that classroom curriculum is rigorous, standards-aligned and research- based," he wrote.

"The state of California has established nationally- acclaimed academic standards and required the adoption of instructional materials to reflect those standards. I continue to be concerned that allowing for the circumvention of the current adoption process will compromise the assurance that parents, students and educators deserve, that the highest level of standards-aligned instructional materials are provided to schools." You betcha.

In researching the proposed legislation, we found that other than the state association of school boards, the only other supporters were bilingual educators and activists.

This year, SB 696 has lost even those linguistic supporters (the association remains loyal) and Escutia has included language that safeguards state academic standards.

However, our opinion remains the same. This is still a Trojan Horse to erode standards and interject more bilingual texts into the classroom. SB 696 also deserves a veto if it makes it onto the governor's desk. It started its journey Wednesday when it sailed through the education committee headed for appropriations. But why delay? The Senate ought to kill it now.

All I can say is that, if they have ANY SENSE AT ALL, they will put a screeching halt to any such idea. It's obvious what this would allow and it ISN'T an ENGLISH CURRICULUM.