New White House Policy Promotes Ethnic Separation—Congress Should Reject It

The Heritage Foundation reports:

The Obama Administration last week unveiled new federal policy recommendations[1] that instruct states to support and encourage children to retain separate languages and cultural attachments. The policy was included in a joint policy statement[2] by the Departments of Education and Health and Human Services (HHS). The Administration stresses that these are mere recommendations that “do not confer any legal obligations,” but notes that failure to implement them may result in the loss of federal dollars.

The statements observe that there exists a “stubborn achievement gap” between dual-language learners (DLLs) and their monolingual counterparts.[3] The former are “behind their peers” in kindergarten, and experience “higher high school and college drop-out rates.” However, the Administration cites “a growing body of research,” which it says indicates that multilingualism confers all sorts of “cognitive and social advantages.” The reason for the mismatch between the promised potential in the cited studies and the observed facts on the ground is due to “the quality of experience [the DLL children] are currently receiving,” it says. “Not recognizing children’s cultures and languages as assets may also play a role in the achievement gap” because of the “low social prestige of minority languages,” say the statements.

The Obama regime bringing back "separate but equal". Imagine that.