Students’ lack of language skills ‘a national emergency’

world languages. Some elementary schools are facing severe cuts to their budgets leading to the loss of their popular language programs — something that brought distinction to those schools and served a diverse racial, ethnic and linguistic student body.

Evidence now exists that districts driven by a vision of multilingualism and global competency are making great strides in closing the achievement gap — or perhaps the more aptly named “opportunity gap” — faced by so many students living in poverty. If we want to address the opportunity gap, we need more languages in schools, not fewer.

Every year hundreds of students prepare for the Independent School Entrance Exam to gain admission to one of Boston’s exam schools. The exam requires students to demonstrate knowledge of a broad vocabulary largely derived from classical roots. With two-thirds of the words now used in English derived from classical languages, why do we limit the study of Latin and ancient Greek? Indeed, many English Language Learners would benefit from the study of Latin, because of its potential to assist in the acquisition of English language arts skills.

Language teaching has come a long way, too. In the past, learning a language meant poring over vocabulary lists of unconnected words, conjugating verbs, or memorizing answers to questions someone was unlikely to be asked in the first place. We can’t tell you how many times we’ve heard someone say, “I spent four years studying a foreign language, I can’t speak a word of it now.” Those days will soon be over.

For students today, learning a language is the principal window through which they explore world cultures. The new law addressing bilingual education signed by Gov. Charlie Baker this past November recognizes this fundamental change.

If we continue to allow most of our nation’s students to exit 12th grade with an English-only curriculum, we cannot say that we are making global readiness a commitment and a priority for all learners. Indeed, Boston Public School students deserve a high-quality, well-rounded, global education — one that leads with languages. America’s future success in a world economy and the role of our students as partners in a global society are tied to language learning.

Julie A. Caldarone is director of world languages for the Boston Public Schools. Michael J. Maguire teaches Latin at Boston Latin Academy. Edward M. Zarrow, who teaches Latin at Westwood High School, was the 2016 National Language Teacher of the Year of the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages. The ideas expressed here are their own.