Being Bilingual is Powerful

For nearly 20 years the state of California has banned bilingual education, and although it has now removed the official barriers, the state has not recovered from the damage.

At that time Barbara Flores, Bilingual Education Researcher and Advocate, and former president of the Central Advisory Board of Education-CABE, in San Bernardino, experienced the ban on bilingual education in California.

In 1953, Barbara was thrilled to go to kindergarten, but that feeling was short-lived.

She recalls that the values she learned from her family helped her to move forward and decide that she wanted to be a teacher.

Barbara Flores, Bilingual Education Researcher and Advocate, and former president of the Central Advisory Board of Education-CABE, assures that the benefits of bilingual education are proven, but at that time Barbara like many other Latino children, were punished for speaking Spanish and told “You have to learn English and at home in Spanish.”

Barbara Flores shares that as a child learning English, she decided that I was going to be a teacher.

In addition, the adversity she experienced turned her into a fighter for our community, not only did she become a teacher but also a professor at the university, and she shares what she learned.

Barbara Flores asks parents to help their children maintain their language because she says that if they lose their language they lose their children.

Barbara Flores shares an important piece of advice: value who we are, and where we live because language is our culture.

She made it clear that being bilingual is power.

It is worth noting that the ban on bilingualism in California has been on and off, voters banned it again in 1998, and reversed the last ban in 2016.

According to researchers bilingual education helps students learn English faster and can improve their standardized test scores, increase graduation rates, better prepare them for college and much more.