Utah won’t cut funding to its renowned immersion programs

SALT LAKE CITY — A legislative committee is recommending no change to how Utah’s dual language immersion program is funded.

During a meeting Thursday of the Public Education Appropriations Subcommittee, the chairs announced they recommend retaining the roughly $7.3 million funding for the program that allows students to learn languages such as Chinese, French, German, Spanish and Russian.

This comes after former state Sen. Howard Stephenson, the original sponsor of the dual language immersion program, had warned lawmakers were considering defunding it by reallocating the money in a way that would “decimate the DLI program as we know it.”

Please read more here.

But some Utah Mandarin immersion programs are struggling

BRIGHAM CITY — The Box Elder School District is going to remove the Chinese immersion program for new students, citing “declining interest.” Still, some parents are urging them to reconsider.

The Chinese dual immersion program at Golden Spike Elementary School is ideally supposed to have 60 new kids each year to make up two classes. Instead, its enrollment is about half of that amount. Despite the low enrollment, parents who have seen the program work say it’s too valuable to drop.

Please read more here.

And here Blue Valley is also cutting its program.