Letters 01
EPP February 2001 Letter on Bilingual Education Resolution

February 26, 2001

Chancellor Harold Levy
New York City Board of Education
110 Livingston Street
Brooklyn, NY 11201

Dear Chancellor Levy:

The resolution that will be presented to the Board of Education on February 27 is an improvement over the previous resolution. EPP remains concerned, however, that the language does not explicitly state that there will be an additional investment in upgrading all instructional options for English Language Learners. Immigrant children have a right to high quality instruction, no matter what "choices" their parents make. Will some "choices" be penalized by continued underfunding and understaffing?

So far, the Office of Management and Budget has only scheduled an $8.9 million dollar increase in the B.O.E. budget for "Project English" classes during the school year rather than an equitable distribution of resources across all instructional programs for ELL students. EPP urges the members of Board of Education to make a commitment that bilingual, dual language, and ESL programs will:

    • be better funded
    • be better staffed
    • have curricula that meets the Regents learning standards
    • be provided with appropriate textbooks and other instructional materials.

The inclusion of a fourth choice for parents should be accompanied by a good faith commitment to improve the quality of all ELL instructional choices.

Sincerely
Marilyn Braveman, Chairperson
Noreen Connell, Executive Director

 

POLICY ON USE OF MATERIALS ON EPP WEB SITE: Individuals and organizations are free to reproduce and/or forward information contained on our web site without prior permission, but we ask that the Educational Priorities Panel be cited as the source of the information. For puposes of clarity, we recommend:
1) when reproducing pie charts and graphs, all the information that appears on them should also be reproduced and
2) when reproducing reports, footnotes should also be included.