Bob Filner: “Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to the Roth amendment. I come to this debate as a classroom teacher for more…”

“Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to the Roth amendment. I come to this debate as a classroom teacher for more than 20 years. I come to this debate as a former school board member, and president of the school district in San Diego, CA, which has had as much experience in bilingual education as any school district in this Nation. I have been in hundreds of classrooms, talked to thousands of students and their parents. This is not a failed educational method. Bilingual education works in San Diego, CA, and all over this Nation. I have watched the debate for the last hour or so, and the aims of all of my colleagues are the same. The aims are to teach English to children as rapidly as possible. I have seen bilingual education work in San Diego, I have seen the test results, I have talked with children. It does work. We cannot let children fall behind in the basic skills of mathematics and social studies while they are learning English. Bilingual education is a way for these students to keep up with those basic skills while learning the English language. I beg my colleagues in this House not to hurt the children in San Diego and the rest of this Nation. Do not cut this program out. Do not allow bilingual education to fail. It is a working program and we should continue to help these children.”