Ingraham Claim: Students Suffer Academically And Culturally Because Of Increase In Spanish-Speaking Population

Ingraham: “We Shouldn’t Coddle Kids In Schools By Teaching Them Math In Spanish.” In November, Laura Ingraham responded to a caller from North Carolina by discussing what she called the transformation “of public education, and not in a good way,” by a supposed influx of “illegal immigrants” and “unaccompanied minors” in certain states. Ingraham claimed that “illegal immigrant families are demanding dual-immersion teaching,” and that “teaching [English language learners] math in Spanish” was “creating this safe zone” for students to avoid learning English. Ingraham also asserted that English “should be the national language of this country.” From the November 4 edition of Courtside Entertainment Group's The Laura Ingraham Show (emphasis added):

LAURA INGRAHAM: You know what the plan is, Eddie, and I'm glad you're calling from North Carolina, because North Carolina is one of those interesting states where they've brought in so many illegal immigrants. When I say brought in, they know they were coming in and they didn't turn them back, OK? So, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia. And many of the unaccompanied minors have been dropped into these states and are changing the way public school is being taught in many of these states. Oh, Virginia, how did I forget Virginia? We already know about California and New York. But in Virginia it is transforming public education, and not in a good way. So now the illegal immigrant families are demanding dual-immersion teaching. Now you can argue that if a community wants to have an immersion program, well, fine. But not because it's demanded by people who are in the country illegally and their various advocates who make big bucks out of promoting it. I personally love people speaking more languages, but English is the primary language. It should be the national language of this country. We shouldn't coddle kids in school by teaching them math in Spanish. No. That's not how it works. My daughter learned English in about six, seven weeks. She was three years old. Now she was speaking English at a 3-and-a-half-year-old level. But she learned that -- oh my gosh, she learned English. It was scary how fast she learned it. And it can be done. But you can't do it by creating this safe zone, OK, you can speak Spanish in this part of the school and then in this part of the school, when it's comfortable for you, you can speak English, but no pressure. No pressure for you to speak English, at all. In fact, we're going to give you ballots in Spanish. in Mandarin, in Farsi, in French, and all these other languages, and you can just be part of our society living a completely separate life. And in fact we're going to make fun of the Americans who don't speak Spanish. [Courtside Entertainment Group, The Laura Ingraham Show, 11/4/15]

Ingraham: “Kids In Public Schools Should Not Be Taught In Dual Languages” Because “This Is Our Culture, And This Country Is An English-Speaking Country.” In February, Ingraham recounted a conversation she claimed to have had with a Spanish-speaking cab driver in Miami who said the public schools there taught in Spanish. Ingraham then argued that schools should not teach “in dual languages,” and lamented that “everybody has to bow down to the new immigrant class” by teaching in multiple languages. From the February 10 edition of The Laura Ingraham Show:

LAURA INGRAHAM: No one's speaking English at all in Miami anymore. It's all Spanish. And I love the Spanish language, you all know that, and I speak some pretty good Spanish. But this is a microcosm of what annoys so many native-born folks in this country, that when you come here, you come here legally, great. Love to have you, part of the American experience. But you've got to speak the language. Trump talks about that. This is an English-speaking country. Kids in public schools should not be taught in dual languages, which is what's happening. This driver of mine, Adrian, told me that the public schools, they teach in Spanish.

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I had the [driver] this morning, who was a nice kid. But I would say things like this: “How old is your sister?” That's a pretty simple question, right? And he would say in Spanish, “Cómo? Cómo?” Like what? “Mean, uh, niña?” I said, “No, no, no. Yes, no. Not your child, your sis --” I mean, it was just amazing. But I think people are all tired of that. They're tired of the “I'm coming to your country to change your culture and your language” mentality. And to take your jobs. I'm not saying the Cubans are the same as the Guatemalans or the Hondurans or the Mexicans. But I do think it's a frustration that the middle class has with this idea that everybody gets a -- everybody has to bow down to the new immigrant class. And no, no, no. We welcome you if you come here legally, but this is our culture, and this country is an English-speaking country. I think people are tired of it. I'm tired of it, and so it ticks me off. [Courtside Entertainment Group, The Laura Ingraham Show, 2/10/16]

Ingraham: “We’re Lowering The Bar” In Schools For “Millions Of People Who Are Illiterate In Their Own Language, Let Alone Literate In The English Language.” Responding to a recent change in policy at Wayne State University in Detroit, MI, which modified requirements for math courses, Ingraham lamented that U.S. schools were “lowering the bar” to accommodate “millions of people who are illiterate in their own language, let alone literate in the English language,” and that it amounted to saying “the heck with our kids.” From the June 21 edition of The Laura Ingraham Show (emphasis added):

LAURA INGRAHAM: I keep saying you can't make this up. But what do we expect? We’re lowering the bar so more people can clear the bar. We’re bringing in millions of people who are illiterate in their own language, let alone literate in the English language. We’re having to change the way we do testing to accommodate those individuals. We have to change the way we teach to accommodate them. To heck with our kids, and now we have to dispense with a math requirement altogether because I guess we're just not up to the task? How did we ever put a man on the moon? How did we ever have this generation of innovators? How did we invent all this medicine, and all these cures and vaccines? And now as a result of everything we have decided about education and parenting and government, we are now at the point where universities are saying, “Nah, we’re not going to have a math requirement at all.”

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So do you think math matters? Does math matter anymore? What else doesn’t matter? Let’s say English -- soon it'll be English, you don’t need to know English, you don't need to write. You can just tap out your inanity with a bunch of emojis. [Courtside Entertainment Group, The Laura Ingraham Show, 6/21/16]

Public Schools Teaching In Both English And Spanish Are “Post-American Or Anti-American” And Allow Immigrants To “Spit On Our Traditions.” Discussing the Democrat Party’s draft platform for the 2016 election, Ingraham suggested that support for language immersion schools and public schools that are “teaching English, Spanish on the same track” allows immigrants to “spit on our traditions.” Ingraham called this type of dual language instruction “post-American or anti-American.” From the July 5 edition of The Laura Ingraham Show:

LAURA INGRAHAM: And that dovetails back to our conversation earlier about the Democrats now making it official in their platform that illegal immigrants will not have to learn English to become U.S. citizens. But I’ll tell you one thing, folks, you’re going to have to learn Spanish. You want to make it in this society today? Jeb Bush said that, though, remember. ‘It’s stupid not to speak another language.’ Remember that comment from him? A lot of Republicans agree with this. You all just aren’t multicultural and multilingual enough and, you know, look I speak Spanish and Russian and pretty good at both. I love languages, but the idea that kids are going to have to learn primary languages in Spanish, which you know is coming, and I’ve heard those stories from south Florida. We have full immersion schools now, public schools that are teaching English, Spanish on the same track. Now again, I love languages. I think it’s great for kids to learn other languages. But the idea that now we’re so post-American, or anti-American, post-American, whatever you want to call it, that now even English is considered a tool of oppression. Yeah, I mean, don’t you make us speak English. Are you kidding me?

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We’re either going to give it away, give away our freedom, our independence, our tradition, our heritage. We’ll give it all away, squander it, or we’re going to stand up and fight for it, and say look, we love immigrants, come here and believe in the melting pot. Believe in our traditions and our culture. Bring some of your own in, that’s fine. Every generation of immigrants does that and that’s great. That does add to the richness of America. But don’t spit on our traditions. [Courtside Entertainment Group, The Laura Ingraham Show, 7/5/16]

Fact: Research Shows Dual-Language Instruction Has Better Academic Results For All Students

Cognitive Benefits of Bilingualism Begin In Infancy And Continue Into Old Age. A literature review of research on language learning in babies and young children concluded that “bilingualism leads to a number of cognitive advantages” in children as young as seven months. The report noted that these cognitive benefits of multilingualism -- like the increased ability to think flexibly and critically -- can extend through old age. From the June 2 report by the University of Washington’s Institute for Learning & Brain Sciences (citations removed):

Although some might be concerned that bilingualism puts children at risk for language delay or academic failure, research does not support this. To the contrary, studies consistently show that, besides the obvious practical and economic gains, bilingualism leads to a number of cognitive advantages. Emerging research supports the view that the capacity to learn language can be equally applied to two languages as to one.

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Rather than causing confusion, it is now understood that the constant need to manage attention between two languages fosters children’s thinking about language per se, and leads to increased metacognitive and metalinguistic skills. Bilingual infants as young as 7 and 12 months have been shown to be more flexible learners of language patterns compared to monolingual infants. Bilingual toddlers exhibit a prolonged period of flexibility in their interpretation of potential words, and bilingual 2- and 3-year-olds are more flexible learners of additional labels for previously known actions or objects, whereas monolingual children often find it difficult to learn labels for actions or objects that already have a name.

A growing body of evidence also suggests that bilinguals exhibit enhancements in executive functioning, which have been observed in children, young adults and middle-aged and older adults. The primary processes of the executive functioning systems are switching attention, flexible thinking (cognitive flexibility), and updating information in working memory. [University of Washington, Institute for Learning & Brain Sciences, 6/2/16]

Journal Of Child Language: Switching Between Languages Does Not Impact Vocabulary Development. Researchers from the University of Maryland reported in the Journal of Child Language that parental “code-switching,” or mixing languages in everyday communication, had no impact on young children’s language learning and development. [University of Maryland , 6/11/15]

Comprehensive Study Found That English-Only School Policies Fail Students Who Are New To The Language. A comprehensive study that examined English-only policies in public education in California, Arizona, and Massachusetts found that “these policies may be more related to immigration politics than to best practices for educating English learners.” It also found that “the facts do not bear ... out” conservatives' claims that “English-only instruction is superior to bilingual education.” From a review of the UCLA’s Civil Rights Project study:

[The study] Forbidden Language asserts that the promise that restrictive language policies made -- that English learners would close the achievement gaps with English speaking students and more rapidly acquire English -- have not been realized. Moreover, the studies suggest that such policies may violate English learners' right to an education equivalent to that of their English-speaking peers as mandated by the Equal Educational Opportunity Act (EEOA).

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UCLA Professor Gary Orfield, co-director of the Civil Rights Project and a contributor to Forbidden Language stated, “The book ends not with a call to return to the good ole' days but challenges policy makers to adopt a new, more expansive and more enriching vision that builds on the resources that these children of immigrants bring. It is time that the U.S. join the rest of the developed world in viewing bilingualism as an asset, not a deficit.” [University of California, Los Angeles, The Civil Rights Project, accessed 11/5/15]

Stanford U. Study: Dual-Language Programs Lead To Better Long-Term Student Outcomes. A Stanford University study examining the short- and long-term effects of four different English language instruction approaches found that English language learning students who participated in dual-language programs outperformed their peers who received English-only instruction in the long term. Preliminary research concluded that:

The results show that while students in English immersion programs perform better in the short term, over the long term students in classrooms taught in two languages not only catch up to their English immersion counterparts, they eventually surpass them both academically and linguistically.

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“One of the big arguments against bilingual education is that it may do students a disservice because they don’t learn English well and also suffer academically. Others contend that English Learners in English immersion classrooms are suffering because they spend the first couple years not knowing what’s going on,” [the lead researcher] said. “Our data suggest that students in two-language classrooms—those where they are taught both in English and their first language—do better if we just give them enough time. Focusing on the long term is key.” [Stanford University News Center, 3/25/14]

Linguistics Expert: “The Best Way” To Teach English Language Learners Is “In Their First Languages” And With Cultural Support. On The Washington Post’s education blog, Yale professor and language education expert Claire Bowern explained that English fluency among immigrant children increases among second and third generations, regardless of instructional policies, but that “research is again clear that the best way” to support English language learners “is to teach students in their first languages” and to offer additional supports that English-only instruction often lacks (emphasis added):

All research on this topic, from multilingualism to the causes of language endangerment, has shown that immigrant kids will most likely pick up the major language within a generation, whatever the policies are. In the United States, second-generation fluency in English is around 80 percent, while third generation fluency is well over 90 percent.

English-only won’t get more people speaking English; they’ll learn English no matter what. But will they have access to good literacy, education, and all the other prerequisites for success that go along with that? Only if they’re well supported in school. And research is again clear that the best way to do that is to teach students in their first languages, to maintain school attendance by making school relevant to their experience, and by employing teachers who are role models. [The Washington Post, 10/24/14]

Ingraham Claim: Bilingual Education Is An Economic Burden

Ingraham: “Working Class Folks” Have To “Pay The Price” For Forced Dual-Immersion Classes In Public Schools. In response to an article about the dozens of languages spoken in public schools in several states, Ingraham suggested “low-income families” and “working class folks of all backgrounds” have to “pay the price” of having “illegal immigrants in their school systems.” Ingraham implied all children would be forced to “learn in Spanish,” resulting in “people speaking broken language working at various retail establishments.” From the October 26 edition of Courtside Entertainment Group’s The Laura Ingraham Show:

LAURA INGRAHAM: All these other people, they have to deal with the illegal immigrants in their school systems, and the hospital bills going up, infrastructure. All of the resources that are being drained. Oh, now dual-immersion classes in Spanish -- so your kid, oh dual-immersion, you’ve got to learn in Spanish.

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Most research indicates that it takes students at least four years to become fluent in academic English. In other words, people can speak broken English, but to succeed in school you have to speak English.

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[O]nce students are reclassified as former English language learners, they no longer receive specific aid, special programs to support their English language development. The money this all costs is staggering. And, hence, I think that a lot of people are noticing this, have noticed it. People speaking broken language who work at various retail establishments. Language is terrible. They can't understand you, and you can't understand them. Sometimes you think you're in a foreign country. [Courtside Entertainment Group, The Laura Ingraham Show, 10/26/15]

Ingraham: Increase In Immigrant Students Is “A Demographic Disaster” “For The Way We Educate.” In October, Laura Ingraham argued that a slight dip in test scores nationwide was largely due to a “Latino push” of “immigrants from poor backgrounds” who “can’t keep up” into U.S. schools. After attempting to speak Spanish, Ingraham read from an article in The New York Times that reported on a slight downturn in national math test scores and detailed a number of potential factors that may have contributed to the change. Ingraham then concluded that the slight shift was due to a lack of resources brought on by immigrant children enrolling in public schools. From the October 28 edition of The Laura Ingraham Show (emphasis added):

LAURA INGRAHAM: Maybe we shouldn’t be importing so many people who are illiterate in their own languages, let alone literate -- or illiterate -- in English. We’ve had a massive demographic change in this country that nobody voted for. That, as far as I can tell, nobody wanted, with the exception of big business and some activist groups.

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The argument that [Latino immigrants] are all conservative and it’s a net plus for the country, it’s so positive. Until we see the schools having to scramble to accommodate these students not only speaking Spanish, but dozens and dozens of foreign languages. And then, on top of it, they’re having to learn this new way of learning, which is the Common Core. So the American kids themselves, of course, are struggling with Common Core, but then you add in the burgeoning immigrant population, both illegal and legal, from Muslim countries, from Latin American countries, and this is a disaster brewing. For the way we educate and for our overall viability as a country.

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About a quarter of public school students today are Hispanic, compared with less than 10 percent in 1990. My friends, this has been a demographic disaster that none of us voted for and that has had a profoundly negative effect on state budgets, our ability to educate native-born Americans, on jobs and wages, and, you bet, our culture.

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Before we welcome the call, I want to read this to our audience. “The stagnating performance on the new math score release could also reflect the demographic changes sweeping America’s schools and the persistent achievement gap between white students and minorities, as well as between students from poor families and more affluent peers.” Here’s a quote, William Bradshaw, the director of National Assessment Governing Board: “It’s not unusual when you see lots of different things happening in classrooms to see a slight decline before you see an improvement.”

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The Latino push into the schools has clearly, probably hurt both the African-American kids and the poor white kids, because you just don’t have that many resources. [Courtside Entertainment Group, The Laura Ingraham Show, 10/28/15, 10/28/15; The New York Times, 10/28/15]

Fact: Bilingualism Has Lasting Economic Benefits Nationwide

UCLA Study: A Body Of Research Proves Numerous “Economic Advantages Of A Multilingual Workforce.” A June study from UCLA’s Civil Rights Project reviewed research on the economic outcomes for students who were fluent in more than one language and found numerous workforce advantages for functionally multilingual workers. As experts Patrícia Gandára and Sylvia Acevedo described in the study, research has shown a greater demand for bilingual workers, resulting in overall higher earnings and “higher occupational status” for those who are literate in both their native language and English (emphasis added, citations removed):

Recently published research shows that employers prefer bilingual applicants. Across all sectors of the economy, businesses overwhelmingly prefer to hire multilingual employees. While not all employers offer additional compensation for these language skills, the sooner a young person enters the labor force, the sooner he or she is accruing experience and seniority and working their way up the pay ladder. Additional research shows that among the millennial generation, multilingual employees are earning more on average.

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The biggest return to education is in supporting native language development to the point of developing balanced bilingualism so both the individual and society can reap the benefits. As these strong bilinguals graduate high school and enter college in increasingly higher numbers, they will earn more in their subsequent jobs, in turn reducing dependence on social services and increasing the amount of revenue they contribute to the local tax base. [University of California, Los Angeles, The Civil Rights Project, June 2016]

The Atlantic: Dual-Language Immersion Programs Are Appealing Because Of Bilingualism’s Global Job Market Advantages. The Atlantic reported that bilingual instruction programs have grown in popularity with native-English speaking, white, and affluent Americans because of what parents view as an eventual bilingual advantage in a globalizing labor market. From a November 10 article:

As two-way immersion grows, the variety of language options now available marks a turning point in the evolution of bilingual education. Once the mainstay of immigrant children, bilingual instruction has a new band of converts: English-speaking parents, lawmakers, and advocacy groups. Research shows that students gain cognitive and academic benefits from bilingualism. Yet an overarching reason for the heightened interest is giving U.S. students a jump on the competition in a global workforce. And some activists find even with this flurry of attention, equal access to dual-immersion remains a thorny issue and persistent challenge.

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In an interconnected and rapidly changing world, many believe that America’s prosperity and economic strength depends on its students mastering a language other than English. Marty Abbott, the executive director of the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages, says the U.S. is still far behind other developed countries in producing a multilingual workforce, due to “the Anglophone factor and Americans believing that English is good enough to get along.” Strides are being made, though, to close the gap. [The Atlantic, 11/10/15]

Cristina Lopez and Dina Radtke contributed research to this post.  

Creative Commons image via Herald Post.