All teachers would be appropriately prepared to effectively teach ELLs, and that linguistic-minority children would be positioned to succeed--has not been delivered. Instead, what seems to be occurring is the further deterioration of ELL education, all in the name of "English for the children." It's awful to think and yet necessary to contemplate the possibility that this was the goal in the first place--that Unz never intended his initiatives to work in the best interest of linguistic-minority children or their families. While we may never know the answer to this question, regardless, current efforts to water down the preparation of SEI teachers, to perpetuate the common myths/misconceptions about language acquisition and teaching, and the absolute misuse of SEI all point to the sad reality that the education of linguistic-minority students under current mandates is simply not a priority. If anything, the priority seems to be focused on accommodating English monolingual teachers who happen to work with ELL students. Every effort is being made for English monolingual teachers to teach as usual and have ELLs accommodate their teachers' lack of training and English monolingualism and not the other way around. This situation would be found to be absurd and intolerable if the students were considered to be high status students. But since they are not, it is perfectly acceptable to miseducate them both linguistically and academically.
Clearly, the matter of educating ELLs is not purely an objective educational undertaking. The dominant society's lack of tolerance toward speakers of other languages renders ELLs' education an ideological battle of sorts where ELLs are being forced to submit to English-only instruction they do not comprehend or benefit from. As districts struggle to implement a vague and misconstrued SEI model, the current research base continues to depict SEI as an inferior program compared to bilingual education (Krashen, 1999; Rolstad, Mahoney & Glass, 2005). Meanwhile, research findings regarding the superiority of native language instruction do not make much of a dent in the assimilationist ideologies of the dominant society.
The unfortunate reality is that SEI as it is currently implemented is a subtractive language program, where students lose their first language as it is replaced by English. What has replaced the use of native language instruction is a black hole in which large numbers of students, their families, and communities are being lost.
SEI in its current implementations not only needs to be radically revamped, but it needs to get hack to its original intention, which was to support other more humane and sound pedagogical models such as native language instruction, in order for it to be effective and work in the best interests of students. The needs of the ELLs in the state of Massachusetts are substantial. Further guidelines from the Massachusetts State Department of Education, including requirements for English language development and qualified teachers, will hopefully begin to rebuild resources and services that were unnecessarily eliminated by the school district's fast interpretations of the new law. The foundation for this rebuilding can be found in a valuable resource that exists in many of the state's former bilingual teachers.
Using quality research on second language acquisition, culture, and literacy development as well as on professional development, means that schools and their mainstream and SEI teachers have to work hard and think long-term to teach English without placing the responsibility solely on the ELLS. As educators, we have a responsibility to walk within the shoes of our students and wonder what the world would be like if only a small portion of your school day was actually comprehensible. You do not understand the directions for the homework. You do not have vocabulary to ask for assistance. You are unable to show all of the knowledge you bring to the classroom. As parents, we have to ask ourselves if we would tolerate such politics and poor educational practices to dictate the education of our children. AS taxpayers, we cannot afford to have generations of our children without the earning power of a high school diploma or a college education. AS citizens, the fundamental question is: Is it moral to leave behind the largest growing segment of our student population?
