Bilingual Education and America's Future: Evidence and Pathways
Abstract
As the population of students classified as English learners (EL) grows and EL-classified students continue to experience barriers to opportunity, the need to improve services and supports for EL-classified students becomes increasingly urgent. In this piece we advocate that the next twenty-five years of education and social policymaking should include establishing, through federal policy, bilingual education as the standard service for EL-classified students. Our argument is based in a rigorous, comprehensive synthesis of evidence for the benefits of bilingual education, bilingualism, and biliteracy for students and the nation, a supportive sociopolitical moment, and a wealth of resources and knowledge to support implementation. We also make the case for a series of incremental federal, state, and local policy actions to build towards bilingual education as the standard for EL-classified students. We outline these actions as well as key considerations to guide the incremental policy implementation and the implementation of bilingual education as the standard service for EL-classified students.