The Sociopolitical Struggle and Promise of Bilingual Teacher Education: Past, Present, and Future

Routledge. Available from: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. 530 Walnut Street Suite 850, Philadelphia, PA 19106. Tel: 800-354-1420; Tel: 215-625-8900; Fax: 215-207-0050; Web site: http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals

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15

Bilingual Education; Bilingual Teachers; Teacher Education Programs; Educational History; Immigrants; Racial Bias; Hispanic American Students; Educational Policy; Language of Instruction; Teacher Educators; Institutional Characteristics; Equal Education; Civil Rights; State Legislation; Literacy; Spanish; English (Second Language); Course Content; Family School Relationship; Critical Literacy; Elementary Secondary Education

10.1080/15235882.2018.1540367

1523-5882

This article draws from historical, political, theoretical, and practice perspectives that provide a comprehensive analysis of how bilingual teacher education programs have strategically navigated around and through anti-immigrant sociopolitical ideologies to survive the incessant attacks on Latinx student populations, notably in the two decades since Proposition 227 was passed in California and, later, similar legislation in Arizona and Massachusetts. These restrictive language policies not only eradicated K-12 bilingual education in many public schools, they also brought an end to most bilingual teacher education programs in higher education institutions. As a result, conversations intensified among bilingual teacher educators across the nation, revolving around the challenges of identifying, naming, and confronting the unyielding issues that arise in the preparation of and professional development for bilingual teachers. Most significantly, this article discusses how a long-standing bilingual teacher preparation program in a Hispanic Serving Institution not only survived in an era of restrictive language policies but has forcefully reemerged as a bilingual teacher education program with equity and critical consciousness at the core. The revised program has energized and mobilized groups, neighborhoods, communities, districts, campuses, and networks to reengage the radical nature of transformative collective action. Now thriving under Proposition 58, which brought an end to restrictive language policies, the program serves as a model for other bilingual teacher preparation programs and is currently driving the language rights movement to reinstate bilingual education in California.

As Provided

117

2019

EJ1202430