Feedback on journalistic text Mastery of English

[Francisco Gomes de Matos]

I have read the news item with great interest but
find the use of the verb FORCE  antithetical to
a human linguistic rights perspective. Why not
MOTIVATE, or ASK ?Forcing a human being to
learn a language  sounds  oppressive to me ...
Once in a while I come across such uses of
FORCE in materials for teachers . I imagine whoever
uses it  is not aware of the underlying authoritarianism...
Francisco Gomes de Matos
Recife,Brazil

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Harold F. Schiffman" <haroldfs at ccat.sas.upenn.edu>
To: "Language Policy-List" <lgpolicy-list at ccat.sas.upenn.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, August 23, 2005 10:10 AM
Subject: Mastery of English


> >From The Enterprise, southofboston.com
>
> Mastery of English essential for grads
>
> If students flunk a test, do you get rid of the test or work harder to
> educate the students? The answer should be obvious, but there are still
> too many people making excuses for students who do poorly on tests. With
> more including Massachusetts requiring students to pass exams to graduate
> from high school, we need to do a better job of teaching students and stop
> making excuses.
>
> The Center for Education Policy has just released a study that says
> students who are immigrants fail to pass MCAS-type tests at a 30 to 40
> percent higher rate than students born here. The suggestion was that the
> tests were unfair to students for whom English was a second language.
>
> "Do we want a lot of high school students who don't have diplomas ...
> because they are still acquiring English?" asked one critic of the exams,
> language educator Deborah Short. What is the alternative? Give diplomas to
> students who haven't met the same standards as every other student? That
> is not acceptable.
>
> Short is absolutely correct when she says the failure to obtain a high
> school diploma limits opportunities in life. But school districts have to
> work harder to help these foreign-born students reach a higher level.
> Handing them a diploma and shipping them out into the world does a
> disservice to the students and to any potential employer who, in effect,
> is defrauded by the diploma the student has received.
>
> If it means keeping students back a grade, then so be it. If it means
> summer course and after-school instruction, those also should be
> considered. In fact, many school districts have such programs. The entire
> focus should be on giving all students no matter their first language the
> best education possible. Forcing a student to know the English language
> before he graduates high school is a requirement that will pay him
> dividends for the rest of his life.
>
>
http://enterprise.southofboston.com/articles/2005/08/22/news/opinion/opinion01.txt
>
>
>
>
> -- 
> No virus found in this incoming message.
> Checked by AVG Anti-Virus.
> Version: 7.0.338 / Virus Database: 267.10.14/79 - Release Date: 22/08/2005
>
>