Workforce Language Services

Young children are masters at learning quickly and through immersion, especially when it comes to picking up a second language.  Westchester County in NY recognizes this, and is not only attempting to prepare the county’s children to be bilingual adults, but is also using language instruction as a way to bring together a community divided by ethnicity and language barriers.  Anecdotal evidence from the new program which provides Spanish as a Second Language instruction to English-speaking children shows that it has begun to unify once splintered groups of students as well as increased trust between parents with different native languages:

In 2003, with increased emphasis on standardized tests exposing how poorly bilingual students were doing in English, Tarrytown did away with most bilingual classes. Tarrytown also found that bilingual students had a tendency to stick together, said Michele Milliam, principal of the Tappan Hill School.

Under the new regimen, where almost everyone studies two languages, teachers are noticing that Hispanic and white children are more likely to play together and that parents from different cultures are more willing to approach one another.

“It’s not as easy to harbor stereotypes when it’s their children your children are mixing with,” said Dr. Howard Smith, the superintendent.

Westchester County’s experience provides a very real example of the benefits of promoting bilingualism to give children immensely useful skills for their future and also to capitalize on the community’s cultural and linguistic diversity.