The State of Foreign Language Learning in New York
By Marie Holmes

When Dawn Santiago-Marullo entered school in Puerto Rico, she studied both Spanish and English, and soon thereafter, French as well. When she was 10 years old, she moved to the United States, where school was conducted in English only. Now an experienced Spanish teacher in Rochester, she says, “I’d like to see the day that our country values languages the way other countries do.”

There are some schools, a small yet growing number of them public, that offer foreign language instruction in the early grades. Such a program was established in the Bronxville schools, and the district’s efforts were recently lauded by the New York State Association of Foreign Language Teachers (NYSAFLT), of which Santiago-Marullo is president-elect. While impressed by Bronxville’s effort, of the NYSAFLT award Santiago-Marullo says, “it’d be great if the state could do that and we didn’t have to.”

“We’ve always said, the younger you are the easier it is to learn a language,” says current NYSAFLT president Joan Militschner. “It’s been shown that the brain before puberty is much more accepting of another language,” she adds.

Such elementary-school programs, however, tend to exist in more affluent areas, such as Bronxville.

“You hate to see kids lose access to that because they’re not in the right place at the right time,” laments Santiago-Marullo. It might seem frivolous for struggling schools in working-class districts to worry about teaching elementary schoolers French when just 65 percent of high-schoolers in the state were able to pass the Regent’s Competency reading exam in the 1999-2000 academic year. Only 67 percent passed the writing test, and a dismal 55 percent managed to pass the math exam.

Yet skills acquired in learning a foreign language, says Militschner, can later be applied to another language, even reputedly more “difficult,” non-European languages such as Chinese and Arabic. Dr. Ingrid Pufahal, a linguist and author of a language learning study commissioned by the U.S. Department of Education has remarked that research has also shown that children who learn foreign languages gain improved cognitive skills and a better understanding of their own first language.

In other parts of the world, says Santiago-Marullo, it is assumed “that educated people speak more than one language.” “Our nation,” she adds, “became complacent about our place in the world and assumed that the rest of the world would learn English for us, and now we see that’s not true.” The current focus on international relations has heightened awareness in the U.S. of the need for future diplomats and military specialists to learn foreign languages, and non-government employers are eager to hire bilingual employees as well. In New York state alone, 630,918 jobs are related to exports to other countries.

NYSAFLT, explains Militscher, is committed to promoting the study of foreign languages through public advocacy. She would like “to really show [students] the importance of learning another language and show them that it’s not just a school subject but a very practical tool they can use to enhance their careers and also to enhance their lives.”

The association holds a May colloquium, a summer institute and various other professional development activities. Their website, www.nysaflt.org, lists these resources as well as information about undergraduate and graduate scholarships and travel grants for current teachers.#

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