Advocacy+Letter

Thomas D. Monteverde EDS730 Dr. Gowri Parameswaran 18 September 2007

__Advocacy Letter__

The current educational institutions of the United States are in disarray. The youth of America have steadily declined in academic prowess over the last forty years and many industrialized nations have surpassed the United States in academic ability. Adolescents at age fifteen from forty different countries were recently tested in an international exam. The United States placed fifth despite the fact that according to a 2005 report from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and development (OECD) the United States spends more money than an other country per student on education. An assumptioncan be made that spending the most would lead to the most knowledgeable students, but that is not the case. This is an example of the inefficiency of the public school system in the United States. With regards to these statistics it is obvious that there is no singular fix to the state of education in the United States, but certain steps can be made to create more efficient methods of educating the nation's youth.

One area that could benefit from reform would be the area of language education. There are several problems with language education that if resolved would create a positive effect on the state of applied lingustics. Being bilingual can be very benifical to a students acedemic career. Andrea Mechelli of London's Wellcome Department of Imaging Neuroscience contrated brain density of bilingual people and monolingual people. The study found that the brains of bilingual people had a much denser gray matter by comparison. Gray matter is the tissue of the brain associated but not isolated to language, memory and attention. Most students in the United States however do not benefit fromlanguage education in this way. Language study is not only important as a compliment to other areas of education, but is also essential to communicate in a global culture.

There has never been a more important time in this countries history to be multilingual. The development of a global economy and the integration of multiple cultures in the United States make education reform in the area of language study a necessity which could have adrastic impact on the united states both economically and socially. The progression of the United States'economy into an economy of innovation has caused the implementation of supply chains stemming from the United States and branching into developing nations. It is a common occuerence for an idea of a product to begin in the united states and then have the majority of manufacturing of the product to be out sourced to developing countries. This out sourcing has spawned the evolution of international corporations and a need for communication that until recent has been superfluous. Without adequate language education, businesses in the United States could be neglected by foriegn markets. Language education is also important socially to the United States. A recent projection from the Bureau f the Census states that within fifty years one-quarter of the United States population will be Hispanic. This deviation in magnitude of constituent populations will have major cultural effects. A large percentage of the population could become seperated by language and cultural barriers if the United States does not take the initiative to acclimate both immigrant and domestic populations to there changing environments. Language education is an integral part in breaking down cultural barriers. The language barrier between english and spanish speaking citizens is already a problem in many United States hospitals. The South Carolina Rural Health Research Center's study of rural hospitals found that only 19.6 percent of rural hospitals used staff interpreters regardless of the fact that 68 percent of rural hospitals are in areas with large spanish speaking populations. This shortage of spanish speaking staff is a major health concern in many hospitals across the United States. This problem could be alleviated if more citizens were fluent in spanish.

As a product of the New York State educational system I am proof of the inadequacy of language education in the United States. My education in foriegn language began in 8th grade at age thirteen and continued for three consecutive years until the end of 10th grade at sixteen years of age. There are similar language requirements for most schools in the United States. Shortly after my education in foreign language I began to retrogress in my comprehension of foriegn language and m ability to retain the knowledge attained was lost. This is a common ocurrence amongst adolescents in the public school system. This is most likely due to the fact that adolescent minds are unresponsive to language education. There are periods in psychological development where a child is more responsive to certain stimulus than at other times. These times of increased sensitivity are known as critical periods. In 1967 a psychologist, Eric Lenneberg, argued that the ability to learn language is itself subject to a critical period that ends abruptly at puberty. Several studies since have corroborated his theory. Of these studies several focused on childrens ability to develop completely new languages with relatively small outside influence while others focused on the inability of feral adolescents to develop language skills after the critical period. Evaluating the research it is possible to come to the conclusion that the optimal period in development of language is between the ages of five and ten. With such information one would assume that the most favorable period for the initiation into foriegn language would be during that same period, but the common age for initiation into foriegn language studies in public schools is between the agees of twelve to fourteen. This is passed the critical period and at the same point that the feral adolescents showed no aptitude for language development. The inability of adolescents to properly grasp the syntax and subtle nuances of a new dialect frustrates and demoralizes them. Feelings of inadequacy can also affect the students ability to learn in other areas of study. The period in child development for the initiation into language study is not the only problem with education in this area.

The duration of time spent on developing foriegn language skills is another prevalent problem with the current educational system. It is believed that longer sequences of instruction lead to higher levels of language proficiency. The correlation between language proficiency and length of study seems to have been disregarded throughout the United States. A student in the public school system on average spends three years studying a foreign language, which could hardly be considered long enough to become competent in any language. This time deficiency causes important aspects of foreign language to be neglected. The language skills learned in school are almost completely ineffective in creating dialogue with a native speaker. Often differences in syntax and inflection are overlooked by students and teachers which are necessary to build a comand of any language. An increase in the duration of time that the program runs would help create significant improvements in student's comprehension in this area and other areas of study.

The measures needed to develop improvement in this area are not unknown to the educational institutions of the United States. In 1979 the Presidents's Commission on Foreign Language and International Studies made approximately 65 recommendations for foriegn language education. The two proposals made above were part of the principal recommendations submitted by the commission. Although some of the proposals were implemented the majority of the recomendations presented by the commission were neglected and never applied to the public education system. If the United States were to follow the advice proposed by its own commissions on education the state of education in the United States would most likely not be as bleak.