Bilingual Education in Puerto Rico

  • Period: to

    Teachers must learn English

    It was establish that all teachers must learn English and all those prepared could be hired to teach.
  • Period: to

    The use of English increases

    The use of the English language increased in schools with the idea of Ebglish becoming the official language.
  • Official Language Act

    The Official Languages Act (Puerto Rico) declares that English and Spanish are co-official languages for government departments.
  • Period: to

    Spanish is suppresed

    The English language is used as a mean of teaching for all grades in the Education System.
  • The Naturalization Law

    The Naturalization Law of 1906 requires immigrants to speak English in order to become naturalized citizens.
  • Using Spanish in other subjects

    Spanish is introduced in First grade in some subjects like Health and Hygine and Reading in Spanish.
  • Spanish as a means of teaching

    It was introduced a bill to make compulsory Spanish as the medium of instruction.
  • World War 1

    The United States enters WWI, which leads to a wave of language restrictions in schools and Puerto Ricans are granted American citezenship.
  • Period: to

    More emphasis in English

    The English teaching/learning has more emphasis because of Juan B. Huyke
  • President complains that Puerto Ricans do not learn English

    President complains that Puerto Ricans do not learn English after 38 years and José M. Gallardo tried to implement bilingual schools but was received with a lot of public protests.
  • Spanish prevails

    The Spanish prevails until Sixth grade and English continues as a second language.
  • Instruction must be in Spanish except English

    Education Commissioner of Puerto Rico, Mario Villarongo, issues a degree that all classroom instruction, except for English courses, must be conducted in Spanish.
  • Lau versus Nichols

    Lau v. Nichols establishes that schools that do not provide provisions for language-minority students are not providing equal education to students and are in violation of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
  • Spanish returns as a primary mean of learning

    The Congress of USA autorizes for all Bilingual Programs in Puerto Rico to have an approach to learning Spanish for the best performance of the students return in the System of Education of Puerto Rico
  • Period: to

    Bilingual Protyects

    The bilingual programs are turned to bilingual proyects and transfer to the English Department.
  • Period: to

    New Bilingual Programs in University

    4 projects were approved for different universities for English as a Second Language
  • Project to Create a Bilingual Citizen

    In 1997, while the statehood party was in power, English
    immersion programs also made their way into Puerto
    Rican schools, under the “Project to Create a Bilingual
    Citizen.” The Escuela Elemental Bilingue de Cidra,
    nestled in Puerto Rico’s central mountains, is one of the
    eight schools remaining of 55 that took part.
  • BEC-21

    A new programs starts in where the immersion of the subjects of Science and Math are to be taught in English were the others in Spanish and teachers are being prepared as Bilingual Teachers.