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First Law for Bilingual Education
A law in Ohio allowed students to be educated in German and English. This is significant because it was enacted to help the larger German population at the time. This law should serve as a model for how we help various populations today. If students need additional support in other languages, there is no reason that we should not be legally required to giving them what they need to be successful.
https://www.csgmidwest.org/policyresearch/0416-FW-bilingual-education.aspx -
Native Americans Must Learn English
This law stated that Native Americans were not allowed to be educated in their own language. There is obviously racial bias here because if students only thirty years ago were taught in German but they were white, why were Natives not allowed to speak in their own language? This shows obvious racial and cultural bias in the law.
http://multilingualmania.com/the-history-of-bilingual-education-as-a-civil-right-in-the-united-states-part-one/ -
Native Americans Boarding Schools
In 1879 Native American students were forced into boarding schools and separated from their families. Of course this would make it even more difficult to learn because their social emotional health would have been so poor. The best schooling relies on a positive relationship between schools, students, and their families, which was not reflected in this practice.
https://content.lib.washington.edu/aipnw/marr.html -
English Only Education
In 1923, 34 states had laws that mandated English only instruction. This is surprising because we know now that English only is one of the ways that is most difficult for students to learn a language. The fact that almost half of the U.S. did not account for second languages shows how misunderstood the concept of bilingualism was.
https://education.findlaw.com/curriculum-standards-school-funding/english-only-instruction-in-public-schools.html -
Cuban Immigrants Enter Miami
After the revolutions in Cuba, immigrants come to Florida. This is significant because only 3 years later in 1961, Florida has several bilingual programs. This shows how states need to meet the demands of their people, and provide them what they need to be successful.
https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED145686 -
Elementary and Secondary Education Act
This Act ensured that schools received funding for all areas of academics, including programs that supported children learning a second language. This was one of the first times that the government had planned to directly support students that were bilingual. This Act would continue to support students in poverty, and ensure a quality education for all students. -
Bilingual Education Act
This act made it mandatory that schools provide bilingual programs to serve their students. Congress now providing funding for these programs as well, and making it acceptable to use other languages in the classroom. This act was spurred by the equality demanded by the Civil Rights Movement.
https://www.congress.gov/bill/93rd-congress/senate-bill/2552 -
Lau v. Nichols
In this case, Lau sued his school district for not providing him with adequate schooling, as they are required to do. This set the premise that English only education was not effective because students can not achieve their full academic potential if they do not have supports in their first language.
https://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/ell/lau.html -
California Proposition 187
This proposition stated that those who were believed to be illegal immigrants would not be allowed public education. Interestingly is was revoked only a few months later after being declared unconstitutional. This was based only on speculation, not on fact, if someone was an illegal immigrant. Again, it seems focused on race, because most likely they were targeting Mexicans, and not, for example, Canadians.
https://scholar.smu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1451&context=law_faculty -
No Child Left Behind
The goal of NCLB is that students that are struggling receive the support that they need, and that schools are held to a higher standard for doing so. While this is important, it was almost taken too far as the pressures of showing improvement outweighed the goal of actually helping the student. Many students, unfortunately, were let behind because it was too difficult to catch them up according to the new standards.
