Ron, I’m just curious–what are the educational compromises you’re referring to that you observed parents making to have those children at those schools? I have my daughter in one of those programs and haven’t felt we’re making any compromises anywhere–she’s getting a great education from very dedicated teachers.

I’m glad to hear you are having success so far raising your children to be bilingual within such an environment. I hope they continue to speak German even after encountering peer pressure at school.

One other comment, regarding schools and the monolingual attitude in American education: The attitude is often somewhat split. For speakers of languages other than English, only English will do. (See, for instance, ‘transitional bilingual education’). For English speakers, though, a second lg may be encouraged. Your case suggests, though, even this encouragement is limited.

Thank you for your comments. Actually, what I find extreme is the extreme monolingualism of the American public education system such that one is forced to potentially make comprises in terms of other aspects of education in order to ensure a multilingual education. Why is it that I “must” be forced to potentially make such sacrifices for my children if I want them to become deep, fully cross-functional multilinguals? The answer: American society doesn’t truly value meaningful multilingualism. If it did, language learning would be a significant part of the whole public education mix right from the start, and no one would be forced to make the “compromises” to which you refer.

So you speak to your children only in a non-native language? Whether it’s extreme or not I wouldn’t want to say. It is interesting though.

We looked at the Denver International School and a public bilingual program as an option for our daughter. We decided against those programs for various reasons. In attending organizational meetings at the schools I noticed there were some parents that apparently so valued their children learning a second language that they were willing to make significant compromises in other aspects of their education. Extreme? That might be a fair characterization.

Here’s more evidence of the fact that in a country of incredible linguistic diversity and widespread multilingualism, that this multilingualism is typically erased from power domains and English monolingualism enforced, in this case the political and government domain in El Paso, Texas, and relegated to the private domain: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/02/english-official-language-border-bilingual_n_1249307.html?ncid=edlinkusaolp00000009

An excerpt from this article: “But Cook, the mayor of El Paso, says he doesn’t see the point of declaring a language either way. According to Cook, the vast majority of El Paso residents are bilingual in both English and Spanish, switching between the two languages as needed. But, ALL government functions are conducted in English.”

Thanks for sharing some findings of your study. It is an extemely interesting area that you are working in and I find intersections between your work and mine in terms of parents’ aspiration for their children education. In my study actors especially the elite want to have their children the mastery of two powerful languages in the country: English ( the language of former colonial power) and Urdu ( the state centrist national language) in order to make their children valuable human resource for national institutions as well as transnational, multinationals, UN Backed agencies. I am grappling with the question of who becomes proficeint Bilingual and who does not. The elites i.e less than 2% of current pakistani population have worked out alternative routes/ institutions endwoing their children with right habitus( Bourdieu, 1991), the rest is silence.

I appreciate your comments, but I have to say, a few forms with multiple languages doesn’t indicate significant support of multilingualism in power domains, including politics. Notice that I didn’t mention media above. Clearly, of the power domains, media is the most solidly multilingual in the U.S., though English still dominates. Public education is almost entirely carried out in English in the U.S., with a tiny percentage of (dual) language immersion schools. A smattering of foreign languages are introduced in middle/high school and they are taught only as a subject with the majority of students acquiring superficial abilities in those languages. There are simply no places or spaces in power domains where most Americans can use, much less are encouraged to use, a language other than English on a regular basis. To me, this does indeed point to the reality of a nation of “enforcers” of monolingualism, though much of this enforcement is unconscious & therefore largely unacknowledged.

Piller, I. Monolingual mindset in the lucky country. February, 3, 2010. Language on the move.

Hornberger, N. H. ( 2003) Continua of Biliteracy: An Ecological Framework for Educational Policy, Research and Practice in Multilingual Settings. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.
Hornberger, N. H. and Skilton-Sylvester, E. (2000) Revisiting the continua of biliteracy: international and critical practices. Language and Education 14 (2), 96-122.
Martin-Jones, M. (2011) Language Policies, Multilingual Classrooms: Resonances across Continents. ( ed. Hult and King) Educational Linguistics in Practice: Applying the local globally and the global locally. Tornonto. Multilingual Matters