St. George school amid Utah's dual-language charge

ST. GEORGE — When 6-year-old Anna Basso comes home from school, she gets to play teacher, helping her mom and dad learn a few things in Spanish.

At Dixie Sun Elementary School in St. George, Basso and her classmates divide their learning time between English and Spanish, something they'll do every day for all of their five years at the school.

But Basso excels at reading English, and her mother, Beckie Basso, said her daughter's progress is representative of a growing body of research that indicates learning in multiple languages doesn't stifle academic achievement, and can even help in learning English.

"It's not for every kid, but for our kid, it's been fabulous," Basso said. "It takes some extra work from home, but it's a great opportunity for her."

This year there are 57 programs in Utah — 31 in Spanish, 17 in Mandarin Chinese and nine in French. Next year, schools are set to open with German and Portuguese.

Utah is striving to become a leader when it comes to dual-language immersion, opening up programs to various languages across the state in an effort to prepare younger generations for a global economy.

Now the push is on to start up more programs and meet the growing demand from parents who want their children to have an edge, said Gregg Roberts, the Utah Office of Education's world languages and dual-immersion specialist.

"Right now, parent demand is far above our supply of programs," he said, indicating that Utah has a goal of 100 programs and 30,000 students enrolled by 2015.

Long controversial and viewed by some as unfair handouts to immigrant families, bilingual programs are now growing in popularity across the country with dual immersion backed by studies that show achievement in a child's first language can be helped by learning a second.

Children learn the same subjects and follow state curriculum standards like at any other school, but they receive the added benefit of learning a second language.

And the Washington County School District is joining the party, with the board of education voting last week to remove the "pilot" designation from Dixie Sun and make it a permanent program while giving the go-ahead to administrators to pursue additional programs.

"We're thinking this might inspire us to do more," Superintendent Max Rose said after voicing satisfaction with the progress Dixie Sun has made. The school is in the middle of the district pack when it comes to testing, despite having — by far — the highest percentage of minority students and students from low-income families.

English-speaking students have learned Spanish and maintained their academics, while English language learners have made huge strides, said Dixie Sun Principal Dale Porter, going over some of the year-by-year numbers.

That achievement falls in line with education studies such as a 2008 review published by Stanford University professor Claude Goldenberg, who wrote that English-language learners consistently learned to read English better if they learned to read in their first language as well.