AATSP Past-President Martha Vásquez and team visit the office of Texas Senator John Cornyn at JNCL-NCLIS 2019 Language Advocacy Day (Washington DC)

ADVOCATE NOW

AATSP members recognize the unique situations of Spanish and Portuguese in our nation. We advocate for both the teaching and learning of Spanish and Portuguese. To that end, the AATSP endorses America's Languages: Investing in Language Education for the 21st century, the 2017 report of the Commission on Language Learning, which makes a compelling case for the value of languages to the national interest and to the fulfillment of the potential of every American.

The report envisions equal access to language education to provide every child the necessary opportunity to master English in order to fully participate in the economic and civic life of the nation; provide every child who has a home language other than English, to include ASL, the opportunity to master that language; and provide every child in America the opportunity to acquire additional languages. These tenets aim to realize the core social justice inherent in the cognitive, educational, and employment affordances of biliteracy and bilingualism.

The Commission makes five specific recommendations to improve national capacity in language education and meet the goal of universal and equal access to language learning: 1) increasing the number of language teachers; 2) building public-private partnerships to support language education; 3) improving language education for heritage language speakers; 4) improving language education in Native American languages; and 5) making language study abroad more equitable and accessible. The overarching goal is languages for all, "irrespective of geography, ethnicity, or socioeconomic background."

While the AATSP supports all five recommendations, we are particularly interested in the teaching of Spanish and Portuguese focusing on these three issues:

• increasing the number of language teachers
• improving language education for heritage language speakers
• making study abroad more equitable and accessible

Jeffrey Reeder of Sonoma State University with the support of Advanced Placement (The College Board), provided the AATSP with an engaging white paper that details a path towards expansion of Spanish language programs in higher education and improved graduation rates. We invite you to be inspired by the model Reeder presents. Click here to read the white paper.

The NYSAFLT Public Advocacy Committee is gathering information about the concerns that world language teachers have as well as providing a myriad of resources to help them professionally. Click here to take the survey and to explore the resources available to you. 

Click below to listen to an advocacy podcast featuring Amanda Seewald from JNCL-NCLIS. The podcast is sponsored by Vista Higher Learning and hosted by Norah Jones. Click here.

For information about AATSP’s Advocacy Leadership and Governmental Relations Task Force, click here. To sign up for the task force, click here.