[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 34 (Wednesday, March 13, 1996)]
[House]
[Page H2127]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




          PASS H.R. 739, DECLARATION OF OFFICIAL LANGUAGE ACT

  (Mr. ROTH asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute.)
  Mr. ROTH. Mr. Speaker, much has been said this morning about 
education and wasting of money. We spend some $12 billion a year in 
this country, $12 billion a year on bilingual education, which means we 
teach kids in other than the English language.
  Let me tell Members about the Ninth Street Public School in Los 
Angeles. Many of the students in this school are children of new 
Americans, and they want to learn English. Their parents want them to 
learn English, too, but they were so frustrated recently by the 
bilingual education program being foisted on their children that they 
took their kids out of school, boycotted the school for a week.
  What does it say about our educational system when the second largest 
city in America has 300,000 students in bilingual education programs, 
where they are not taught in English, where they are not learning 
anything, and we are wasting billions of dollars. The parents have no 
recourse but to yank their kids out of school to articulate their 
demand for English in the classroom.
  I think it is a disgrace. The students of the Ninth Street School are 
lucky to have parents that will fight the system for their education. 
Let us teach English in our schools again.

                          ____________________