D220 approves Chinese classes

By Carolyn Rusin TribLocal reporter Yesterday at 12:56 p.m.

Barrington School District 220 will offer a Mandarin Chinese immersion program for tots through teens next fall, now that the board of education has voted to accept a $1.5 million federal matching grant for the program for five years.

School board members had been mulling over whether to take on the financial obligation posed by the grant, which was awarded in the summer. They voted 6-1 to accept it at a meeting Tuesday night.

The district  will become the only one in the state to offer Chinese immersion from kindergarten through high school, said Todd Bowen, chairman of the  world language department, who secured the grant from the U.S. Department Education. Chinese already was offered in middle school and high school and now will be extended to the elementary grades.

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