One problem with local development of materials is the need for professional assistance by curriculum development specialists and linguists. School districts have teachers who know what their children need, but the districts often need outside help in assuring that the materials developed actually meet the intended need. The Department is reviewing the role of the Multifunctional Resource Centers and State educational agencies to see if it is appropriate for them to provide or arrange for this type of assistance. We are certain that more centers is not the answer, however. Mr. Roybal: Will the amount of each grant be increased to pay for these costs? Mr. Soriano: An applicant for a Basic Grant is instructed to submit a budget which includes separate information for any training and materials development activities planned. Either Basic Grants funds or Support Services funds may be used to fund the materials development component, if the component is determined to be worthy of funding after review by the panel of experts and OBEMLA staff. In general, support for materials development is given to projects where the materials proposed to be developed are integrated into the district's program for students of limited English proficiency. In 1983, $671,794 in Title VII Support Service funds were allocated for materials development in Basic Grants. Mr. Roybal: How will sound research guide the development of these materials? Mr. Soriano: The Multifunctional Centers have responsibility to provide technical assistance in evaluation procedures. This will provide assistance to districts developing materials. REVIEW PROCESS FOR BASIC AND DEMONSTRATION GRANTS Mr. Roybal: After the applicants for basic and demonstration grants are ranked by an outside panel of experts, are any of the applicants taken out of order in the awarding of the grants? Why? Mr. Soriano: There are several stages in review of Basic Grant and Demonstration grant applications. First, the rank order of applications is determined by outside panels of experts who apply the selection criteria in program regulations in their review of applications and assign points in accordance with the selection criteria. The basic concern in their review is the quality of the application, including how well the applicant justified that the program proposed would serve the children most in need of assistance within the district. Applications must meet the cut-off score announced by the Secretary in the notice of closing date for submission of applications. Secondly, the Bilingual Education Act requires that the Secretary consider not only the rank order of the application but also other factors such as the need to assist children of limited English proficiency who have been historically underserved by programs of bilingual education; geographical distribution of limited English proficient children, nationally and within a State; the ability of local districts to carry out bilingual education programs; and the relative numbers of children from low-income families who will be served by the program. In selecting from applications that meet the various priority factors, the Secretary selects applications according to their rank order, as established by the initial panel review. For Demonstration projects, applications must be submitted against specific priority areas published in the Federal Register, and the application competes against other applications submitted under the same priority area for funds allocated to that priority area. As with the applications under the Basic Grants program, selection of applications for funding of Demonstration projects is not based solely on the rank order of applications determined by applying selection criteria. Once the rank order has been determined, the Secretary then applies a geographic distribution criterion to the set of ranked applications. Within geographical areas, however, applications are selected according to their rank order. Mr. Roybal: Will you provide a list of the projects taken out of order and the reason for doing so. Mr. Soriano: Since Basic Grants are selected based on their rank order, even when under review for responsiveness to one of the several priorities contained in the Bilingual Education Act, and since Demonstration projects are also taken in order within their priority areas or within the geographical distribution, no projects are considered to be taken out of order. TRANSLATING RESEARCH FOR PRACTITIONERS Mr. Roybal: What mechanism exists for translating Part C research into a format that is understandable and useful for practitioners of bilingual education? Mr. Soriano: The Part C Research and Evaluation program itself intends to fund projects that translate results from its studies into materials useful for practitioners. The National Clearinghouse on Bilingual Education will be working to improve its distribution of information to practitioners. This will include translation of research results in materials specifically aimed at local practitioners. Some of its current materials do provide translation of research, although not always for the local practitioner. Examples of these are as follows: O Over one hundred summaries of ongoing and previous research have been completed. In the Clearinghouse's newsletter, Forum, a section called "Research Corner" describes the most recent findings of bilingual education research. Copies of full reports for developing curriculum materials and for restructuring classroom methodology are available to local practitioners. Information analysis products summarize findings of pertinent research and evaluation studies funded under the Part C Research and Evaluation program and other programs. An electronic newsletter system has been established to Finally, the Multifunctional Resource Centers have a responsibility to provide technical assistance to local practitioners to improve their services to limited English proficient children. The centers will draw upon Part C research results as well as those from research programs administered by other sources such as the National Institute of Education and State agencies. EFFECTIVENESS OF ENGLISH-ONLY INSTRUCTIONAL APPROACHES Mr. Roybal: What data do you have that indicate that Englishonly instruction is effective for educating limited-English proficient children? Mr. Soriano: The type of programs which have evidence of effectiveness are those that offer specially designed curriculums taught in English such as the English-as-a-second language (ESL) or English immersion programs. This excludes submersion programs where limited English proficient students are left to "sink or swim" in a regular English-speaking classroom. However, because of past Federal policies that emphasized bilingual instruction and excluded all-English alternatives, only a few studies of these programs exist. A 1981 study conducted by staff of the Department provides a review of this literature. A copy of the summary of the report which was published in a Department of Education publication, American Education, has been submitted to the appropriations committee staff. Selected comments from the report regarding English-only instruction follow. "An Answer from Research on Bilingual Education" The specific questions addressed by this review were: (2) Are there any effective alternatives to transitional bilingual education? That is, should one particular method be exclusively required if other methods are also effective? Of the several hundred studies reviewed, 39 were found to be methodologically valid for our concerns. In these studies, the most frequent home language was Spanish, but other languages were represented. With respect to transitional bilingual education, positive outcomes pertaining to language performance were reported by Covey (1973), Carsrud and Curtis (1980), McConnell (1980), Melendez (1980), Morgan (1971), Plante (1976), Legarreta (1979), AIR (1975), Cohen (1975), and Zirkel (1972). However the case for the effectiveness of transitional bilingual Although there are few American examples of immersion, these programs seem to generally succeed quite well in both second language (L2) and subject areas. Lambert and Tucker (1972) and Barik and Swain (1975) report outstanding progress in second-language learning through immersion in Canada, and PenaHughes and Solis (1980) found immersion superior to transitional bilingual education in Texas. As for nonlanguage subjects, Lambert and Tucker (1972), Barik et al. (1977), Ramos et al. (1967), and Malherbe (1946) all showed that it is possible to teach math successfully in the second language. [In the United States, the second language is English; in Canada, usually French.] This suggests that if the curriculum is properly structured in L2, so that communication is at a level the child can understand, there will be no lasting negative consequences from teaching math in the second language. We found no data in these studies pertinent to other subject areas, which are often more dependent on verbal skills than is math, except Malherbe (1946), who reported an initial deficit in geography scores which disappeared in a few years when all teaching was in L2. Ramos et al. (1967) reported the least favorable results for all-L2 instruction. They found that all-L2 instruction from grade 1 was no more effective after 5 or 6 years than was a program in which all instruction was in Ll for grades 2 through 4, and in L2 thereafter. The available data on ESL instruction are limited. Two studies found structured immersion superior to ESL methods (or French as a second language as it was in these Canadian experiences: Lambert and Tucker, 1972; Barik et al., 1977.) Ames and Bicks (1978) and Balasubrmonian et al. (1973) found that transitional bilingual education programs which included an ESL component were no more effective than ESL alone. Lum (1971) reported that transitional bilingual education which included an ESL component were no more effective than ESL alone on some measures and that ESL alone was superior to transitional bilingual education on other measures. Legarreta (1979) and Ramirez et al. found that a transitional bilingual education program with ESL worked better than a transitional bilingual education program without an ESL component. Ramirez (1973) found ESL superior to submersion. (American Education, July 1983) Early results from the McAllen, Texas, immersion project have found it to be superior to bilingual instruction on all measures. Evaluation of the Fairfax County ESL program indicates its students are attaining high levels of performance. Data covering periods as long as 12 years are available from DISTAR, a specially structured all-English program originally implemented in the Follow Through program for limited English proficient students in Uvaldie, Texas, and San Diego and Monterey, California. The data show high rates of learning for the DISTAR students, who were instructed in all-English. The Uvaldie program has been certified for national dissemination as a model of an outstanding program by the Joint Dissemination Review Panel of the Department of Education. Finally, the extensive research literature on immersion programs in Canada shows that immersion is an effective method of teaching children a new language and that, although instruction is given exclusively in the new language, children made satisfactory progress in their school subjects. A number of schools in Texas, Florida, and California have recently embarked on an experiment to test the immersion method for limited English proficient students in this country. The policy of this Administration is to provide schools with flexibility to explore the various methods available for meeting the special needs of langauge minority students. Federal administrators are not in the best position to determine how to teach children in Brownsville, Sacramento, or Milwaukee. The role of the Federal Government is to ensure that all children are treated fairly and equally by their schools. Local school officials are in the best position to decide what curriculum approach is best for their particular circumstances. To this end, the Administration has revised Federal policy guidelines for the enforcement of the Lau decision and has proposed changes to Title VII that will make the Federal bilingual program more responsive to the needs of language minority students by giving the schools greater flexibility in how they meet those needs. In addition, the Department has initiated several studies exploring various alternative methods for meeting the needs of language minority students. EXTENT OF CAPACITY-BUILDING UNDER TITLE VII Mr. Roybal: What information is available that indicates that capacity building under Title VII has been effective? Mr. Soriano: There is no evidence at present that capacity building under Title VII has been effective. There are some indications that it has not been, since a number of school districts have applied for and received grants to implement bilingual education programs for many years. Also, interviews with local school district superintendents and Federal program coordinators during the Classroom Instruction Component Study found that 76 percent of superintendents and 82 percent of Federal program coordinators felt that bilingual services would be reduced or dropped if the Title VII program funding was ended. These are very high percentages considering that the program is structured as a competitive discretionary program in which no district is guaranteed aid. The districts do not seem to be taking advantage of the Federal funding to strengthen their own capability. |