Resisting the Commodification of Dual-Language Education: Elevating Latinx Parent Advocacy in City-Wide Language Planning

• In Event: Intersectionality of Language, Race, and Class Within Urban Classrooms: Resisting Hegemonic Whiteness in Language Education

Abstract

Along with the recent expansion of dual language (DL) programs nation-wide, are the concerns about their placement (Author, 2015), as well as their increasing commodification (Cervantes-Soon, 2014; Valdez, et al., 2016). Specifically, scholars argue that emergent bilingual, and racially and economically marginalized students should be prioritized when developing new language education placement policies.

In Chicago, schools are required to establish governing bodies called Local School Councils (LSCs), made up of community members (including parents) and school staff (including teachers and the principal). LSCs were established to provide real decision-making power to parents (Bryk, 1998). Since 2018, school administrators - with the support of their LSCs - have had the opportunity to apply for new academic programs through a city-wide request for proposal (RFP) process. Program enhancement options include: STEM, IB, Fine Arts, and Dual Language. Out of 54 requests granted, 7 will be DL but more than half are located in gentrifying neighborhoods. Thus, parents are offered an important role in decision-making around language education for their children, but there are clearly inequities in this policy, influencing the distribution of language programs throughout the city.

Using a Critical Race Theory lens, we examine field notes taken by one of the authors at publicly held district language education meetings in order to better understand the opportunities created for parent participation and decision-making power when DL placement is decided through a city-wide RFP process. We use a critical discourse analysis approach to scrutinize publicly available documents - including district reports and press releases - to understand what values and frameworks guide district leaders in the creation of new language education policies.

We illustrate how the policy of granting programs through an RFP process puts Latinx immigrant and working-class families at a disadvantage. While new DLs were granted in Latinx communities, many will be in gentrified neighborhoods, while 71% of bilingual programs in Chicago (largely located in working-class immigrant communities) are out of compliance with state law (Geovanis, 2018). When it comes to language program placement, the voices of parents that most need to be heard were overshadowed by parents with higher socio-economic status.
This RFP process also highlights how emerging language education placement policies within Chicago align with the larger shift in US language education policy that moves from an “equity/heritage policy framework to a global human capital policy framework” (Valdez, et al., 2016). DL programs are marketed as an enrichment option, and bilingualism as a commodity that can increase students’ human capital, rather than a type of bilingual education which is state-mandated and beneficial for emergent bilingual, and other racially and economically marginalized students (which make up 90% of the district). While we advocate for local control of schools and much-needed parent participation, we must also attend to potential racial and class inequities within processes themselves. We must resist the “reconfiguration of bilingual education by hegemonic whiteness” (Flores, 2016), and privilege the needs and rights of working-class communities of color within language education policy.

Authors

• Ramona Alcalá, University of Illinois at Chicago

• P. Zitlali Morales, University of Illinois at Chicago