Should there be a foreign language requirement in public schools?

Thank you.

Oh, and Nick just clarified exactly why classism, racism, and segregation exists in "The Land of the Free". So... thanks! Heh.

I think keeping it as "Should there be a foreign language requirement in public schools?" because it's a global debate thanks to globalization. Countries are constantly interacting with other people that don't have the same primary language skills. It's a bigger debate than just the U.S. and the spanish language.

I think the only possible wording is marina's last regarding whether there should be a mandatory second language requirement. I don't think there's a real issue here as pertains to spanish in particular. Even in spanish-speaking communities, most people only want to be able to function in spanish, they certainly don't expect Americans in general to have to speak it.

Let me be more clear here... we spanish-speaking people don't really want to listen to gringos practice spanish on us!

By the way... I was told recently that the etymology of gringo is "green go"... as in get your armies out of my country.... I have my doubts....

Judging from a quick search, most (if not all) of the debate regarding mandatory Spanish is taking place in Texas and Florida, which makes sense. As far as I know it's not a national issue.

"Should learning Spanish be mandatory in states with a high percentage of Spanish-speaking people?" Not great, but I'm not sure we should leave the issue unqualified.

I could definitely go with "Should there be a foreign language requirement in public schools?" If there's any debate about it.

Interesting... is this based on anything specific going on, or just kind of in the ether?

I agree that Spanish is unique, but we'd get more stands if we open it up to any second language.

Some sample evidence might help me figure out where we should go on this one... right now I can see either focusing on Spanish or making it about learning a foreign language, period.

"Should there be a foreign language requirement in the public school system?"

(Isn't there?)

Well, no, the percentage of Spanish speaking residents in the U.S is much larger than Chinese, French, German and Russian combined. It is more relevant than the other languages. I'm not going to fight it out though. We need mroe comments.

no... we shouldn't specify Spanish as a language at all.

Chinese, French, German and Russian are other languages taught in school and they are all relevant for certain reasons.

Well, there's definitely a separate issue here. I could live with JZipp's suggestion but Spanish is most relevant, right?

I don't know... we have an issue on whether the United States should have an official language. I understand the idea of singling out Spanish, but I think we should simply ask

"Should learning a second language be mandatory in U.S. public schools?"

You'd have the same argument of "well, some people already know a second language to begin with..." as you would with the Spanish specific issue... I'd rather this be a general discussion on the value of learning a language other than English in today's world.

Should learning Spanish be mandatory in U.S. public schools?