On August 26th, 2008 Susan Imrie (not verified) says:
To "MErlien", let's be clear. Bilingual education stinks of what President Bush aptly refers to as the "soft bigotry of low expectations." I voted against bilingual education, and would do so again today, primarily because in these United States, bilingual education tends NOT to work very well for the group that's supposed to be learning English. It is a SCAM, and the victims are the taxpayers who pay for it, and the kids whose futures are tarnished. Refer to the post by "k.raila", the Amigoes grad who is well aware that the Amigoes program is an exception in this regard.
I grew up with kids who learned English very quickly -- though daily immersion in school! I've lived and worked overseas and became fluent in several languages as an adult. The vast majority of other countries aren't offering free, public bilingual programs for English-speaking kids. When programs like that do exist, they are private.
So, "MErlien", your lame attempt to paint me and other people critical of bilingual education as somehow intolerant is as off base as was Mark Jaquith's intent to smear another Cambridge resident's reputation by starting this blog based on a purposely misinterpreted statement.
Mr. Jaquith, you never responded to Bill Hees' comment above. Now that your irresponsible blogging equivalent of yelling "fire" in a movie theatre has gotten you the sick attention you craved, don't you think it's time to publicly apologize to Fred Baker?
To "MErlien", let's be clear. Bilingual education stinks of what President Bush aptly refers to as the "soft bigotry of low expectations." I voted against bilingual education, and would do so again today, primarily because in these United States, bilingual education tends NOT to work very well for the group that's supposed to be learning English. It is a SCAM, and the victims are the taxpayers who pay for it, and the kids whose futures are tarnished. Refer to the post by "k.raila", the Amigoes grad who is well aware that the Amigoes program is an exception in this regard.
I grew up with kids who learned English very quickly -- though daily immersion in school! I've lived and worked overseas and became fluent in several languages as an adult. The vast majority of other countries aren't offering free, public bilingual programs for English-speaking kids. When programs like that do exist, they are private.
So, "MErlien", your lame attempt to paint me and other people critical of bilingual education as somehow intolerant is as off base as was Mark Jaquith's intent to smear another Cambridge resident's reputation by starting this blog based on a purposely misinterpreted statement.
Mr. Jaquith, you never responded to Bill Hees' comment above. Now that your irresponsible blogging equivalent of yelling "fire" in a movie theatre has gotten you the sick attention you craved, don't you think it's time to publicly apologize to Fred Baker?