The Past and Future Directions of Federal Bilingual-Education Policy

Although initially conceived as an enrichment program, the 1968 federal Bilingual Education Act had been recast into a compensatory education program by the time it was signed into law. Federal civil rights policies respecting language-minority students reinforced the compensatory character of bilingual education in the 1970s by focusing on the so-called deficiencies of language-minority students. In 1980, the Carter administration proposed new civil rights regulations to protect language-minority students. The regulations ignited a political fire storm. The Reagan administration seized upon the political controversy to relax civil rights enforcement and to slash Bilingual Education Act spending. In 1984, Congress expanded the Bilingual Education Act to authorize developmental bilingual-education programs—integrated, two-way programs that help language-minority and English-language-background students achieve bilingualism in English and a second language. With additional federal support, developmental bilingual-education programs could help millions of American students achieve the linguistic skills they will need in the next century.