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Foreign Language Not Required

Pennsylvania Legislature Decided That This Mandate Is Irresponsible

Jul 26, 2007

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Foreign language teachers are in short supply so Pennsylvania is no longer going to require schools to have foreign language programs.

Teacher Crisis

The vote isn't final but the legislature has taken the step in Pennsylvania that they do not have the manpower nor the funding to demand students study a foreign language in high school. After years of discussion, the legislature was unable to find a solution to the problem. The two vital components are

foreign language teacher shortage
cost would be too high

The Stats

How many teachers would be needed to provide foreign languages to Pennsylvania students? 2,683 additional teachers because there are only 300 certified each year in the state. [Eleanor Chute, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, post-gazette.com, June 25, 2007] Not only are the teachers not in place but it would cost $114.5 million to add the teachers if the money was there to fund them. The state board of education Chairman Karl Girton says, "The numbers are overwhelming."

The legislature felt it was irresponsible to mandate the foreign language classes if the funding was not there. While the board of education emphasized that a foreign languages were important, they just could not mandate they be taught in all schools.

Irony

The governor of Pennsylvania is actively recruiting international businesses to Pennsylvania. This effort comes at a time where his state can not afford to educate students allowing them to communicate with the businesses that locate in Pennsylvania. Of course, the school districts in a better financial situation will be able to hire foreign language teachers. Graduates from these high schools will be at an advantage over the students from smaller schools who may not be able to find teachers.

Chinese and Arabic

China is now a financial force that is affecting Wall Street and the distribution of goods throughout the world. While Spanish may be a very useful language in Hispanic pockets of the country, Chinese is "the" language to learn in a global economy. Arabic is a language that is becoming a vital necessity after the September 11th tragedy.

College Prep

The majority of colleges require students to take a foreign language in college if they have not taken 2-4 years of a foreign language in high school. Taking a foreign language class in college is much faster paced and more difficult than in high school. Students without a foreign language may be limited in which colleges they may attend or may have to take foreign language classes in college instead of other classes that could be more related to their field.

Alternatives

Schools will have to take alternative measures and teach classes over an ICN network on a larger scale or find courseware as predicted by Thomas Frey. Frey states that education will change dramatically in the next 5 years.

Related articles: Future Look of Education and Paradigm Shift in Learning

Read previous articles on Educational Issues.

The copyright of the article Foreign Language Not Required in Educational Issues is owned by Barbara Pytel. Permission to republish Foreign Language Not Required in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.

declining foreign language education

Comments

Jul 27, 2007 3:20 PM

Dorit Sasson :

I really hope the vote doesn't take into account ELL (ESL) learners as I was planning to teach ESL in Pittsburgh or at least to get ESL certified for this upcoming year.
I still think the demand for ESL teachers will still be ongoing and strong as the status of English has become so incredibly global.

Jul 27, 2007 3:27 PM

Barbara Pytel :

I would doubt that ESL would be affected since English is considered the language of success. I think this refers to languages such as Spanish, French, German or Chinese that high schools require for graduation.

Aug 1, 2007 4:59 PM

Dorit Sasson :

Still, I think this is a great loss to the language learning professionals and future generations of foreign language learning. Foreign language needn't be eliminated and made obsolete.

Aug 3, 2007 11:06 PM

Barbara Pytel :

I am quite sure that if salaries increased dramatically for teachers, more teachers would appear, as well. Like the professor from Harvard stated--there isn't a teacher shortage. There is a shortage of people that are willing to work for the low pay and in poor conditions.

4 Comments