Newly elected school board member Barb Mitchell is now showing her full support of a possible Chinese Immersion program within the Palo Alto Unified School

District.

Mitchell announced her support for the program on Monday when speaking to the beginning journalism class at Palo Alto High School. The program was presented to PAUSD on March 28, 2006, by an organization named Palo Alto Chinese Education (PACE), said Mitchell. PACE is made up of community members interested in promoting Chinese Education throughout the district. According to the school board and PACE, the group has been working on this proposal for about three years.

"It was one of the most thoughtful and well organized proposals I?ve ever seen," said Mitchell. If installed, the program would be modeled much like the Spanish Immersion program already in place within the district. The program would begin with 20- 40 kindergartners and advance as the pupils grow, says Mitchell. According to Mitchell, one of the main reasons she supports the proposal is that one fifth of our world population speaks Chinese, and she believes the language will become more universal in years to come. Having bi-literate students, according to Mitchell, will help Chinese and Western relationships and communication in the future.

According to Mitchell, there only seem to be a few problems as of now. PACE says they would prefer to start up the program in the fall of 2006, while the School Board has said they would rather take a year to plan the program. This way, says Mitchell, they can work out any kinks our problems that would maybe appear.

Upon inquiry, Mitchell made clear that there were other problems that were being taken under consideration. She expressed concern over the fact that there is limited space in the program?what happens when families who are interested in the program aren?t accepted? Other problems include cost, and possibly other lingual groups becoming jealous over the program. Mitchell pointed out that Palo Alto does value its neighborhood schools, and voices a concern over someday losing them. If other groups were to want their own immersion program, there isn?t much of a solution, says Mitchell.

One large upside, according to Mitchell, is that the project would be revenue neutral, meaning that PACE would pick up the costs of the starting and continuation costs. Mitchell was the assured that the program would have no problem with attracting participants.

"I do think there is a great interest in the program," Mitchell says. The program, according to Mitchell, would be an undecided ratio between native Chinese/Mandarin speakers and students who are completely foreign to it. This will create a balance in the class and give the students opportunities to learn from each other.

Another upside, says Mitchell, is that this program will be much more effective than regular enrichment classes.

"I?ve sat in on a couple immersion classes and I was amazed at the fluency the students spoke with," Mitchell says. This seems to be the goal for the Chinese Immersion program, which will hopefully start in the fall of 2007. The School Board members will have a discussion on April 25 and their final decision will be made on May 9.