Mandarin Immersion Parents Council

Not only does Minnesota have some of the oldest public Mandarin immersion programs in the country, it’s also got a ton of other immersion programs. Plus the excellent Center for Advanced Research on Language Acquisition (CARLA) at the University of Minnesota and the Minnesota Advocates for Immersion Network (MAIN) at http://www.mnimmersion.org.

I count twelve Mandarin immersion programs in the state. But it’s also got Spanish, French, German, Korean, Hmong and Ojibwe.

To take a little tour, check out this list of all the immersion schools in the state here. Note it runs to six full pages.

The MAIN group is especially important for Minnesota’s success in immersion. Instead of each school having to work out how to do immersion on its own, all the immersion programs across the state work together, sharing ideas, plans and systems.

For Mandarin immersion families in the San Francisco Bay area, College Park Elementary School in the San Mateo-Foster City School District is a storied program.

Founded in 2007 as a way to draw families into an under-enrolled school, the program was placed at College Park Elementary School alongside the district’s Gifted and Talented Education program. In 2018 College Park Elementary School was named a California Distinguished School for its high academic performance. 

Now the school district is contemplating developing a new school campus with wraparound services in the North Central neighborhood of San Mateo where the College Park is located. The district has begun discussion with families currently into the school about what the change would look like.

https://asiasociety.org/china-learning-initiatives/college-park-elementary-school

Where or how the Mandarin and GATE programs will be relocated is not clear. Officials say the planning process will continue through June.

Please read more here.

Here’s a story about the district’s efforts to pass a bond measure that was being discussed in 2015.

You can find the list by clicking the Download button below. The changes over the past two years are below that in text format.

March 2022 – Additions

California

Avenues: Silicon Valley

K – 8, private. San Jose, CA.

This is the first West coast outpost of New York’s Avenues: The World School, which opened in 2011. It’s opening a middle school first, grades 6 – 9, a rarity in new schools.

Bell Tower School

K-8 Private, Alhambra, CA

ShuRen School

San Jose Campus.

            Long in Berkeley, is opening a San Jose campus 2022-2023

Santa Fe Computer Science Magnet School, Monrovia Unified School District

148 West Duarte Road, Monrovia, CA

The Middle School the district’s MI program feeds to.

Rondo Elementary School, Eastvale, CA

New K – 5 50/50 Mandarin immersion program beginning in the fall of 2021.

Frontiers Academy

Has moved from Anaheim to nearby Costa Mesa, California

Kennedy Middle School

The Mandarin immersion program of the Redwood City School District, which begins at Orion Alternative Elementary School (formerly John Gill Elementary) reached sixth grade and moved to Kennedy Middle School in the 2021-2022 school year. The program will continue at Woodside High School in 4 years.

Minnesota

Lakes International Language Academy

K-12 charter school, Forest Lake, Minn.

Started 2004-2005, also has Spanish immersion track

North Junior High School

6 – 8, opened 2013-2014 school year, St. Cloud, Minn.

This is the continuation of the Mandarin immersion program at Guang Ming Academy @Madison Elementary

Apollo High School

9 – 12, St. Cloud Minnesota

This is the continuation of the Mandarin immersion program that begins at Guang Ming Academy. The first cohort arrived in the 2017-2018 school year.

New Jersey

Maurice Hawk Elementary School, West Windsor, NJ.

Program launched 2018-2019 school year. Has now reached 4^th grade.

New York

Pine Street School

Private,K-5, Manhattan.

Launched in 2017-2018. Also has Spanish immersion track

Oregon

Harriet Tubman Middle School, 6 – 8

Portland, Oregon

Utah

Tooele Junior High School, Tooele, Utah

Program reached 7^th grade in the 2021-2022 school year.

            The program will continue at Tooele High School in the 2024-2025 school year.

Texas

International School of San Antonio

Originally a French immersion school, it added a Mandarin immersion track in the 2021-2022 school year.

Washington

Bel-Red Bilingual Academy

0 – 8, Bellevue, Washington, launched 2019-2020

Wyoming

CY Middle School

Casper, Wyoming. Program progressed from grade school 2019-2020

CHANGES

E.E. Waddell Language Academy, a K-8 public school in Charlotte, NC, has changed its name to South Academy of International Languages (SAIL)

CLOSURES

Horseshoe Trails Elementary School

At the end of the 2020-2021 school year the Cave Creek Unified School District closed the Mandarin immersion program at Horseshoe Trails, which was founded in 2015. It has just gotten to middle school.

Unable to open: CE Academy

This charter school outside Raleigh, NC had planned to open this fall, but COVID-19 made that impossible. They haven’t given up but it’s been a rough year.

Science Language and Arts International School – CLOSED

I know of three Catholic schools that have faced closure, added Mandarin immersion and now are flourishing. They are All Souls in Los Angeles (see below), Maryknoll in Honolulu and St. Michael’s Catholic Academy in Queens, New York. Am I missing any?

All Souls World Language School in Alhambra broke ground on a new campus expansion project to support the growing school’s dual language and community programs. 

Made possible by grants from Shea Family Charities in collaboration with other benefactors, the buildings will house new classrooms dedicated to STEAM subjects (science, technology, engineering, the arts, and math), a performing arts center, and a “Collaborative Learning Commons” for students. 

The Sept. 23 ceremony was attended by All Souls students, Catholic schools superintendent Paul Escala, Shea Family Charities representatives, and Alhambra Mayor Katherine Lee. 

Please read more here.

My kids are prone to say things like, “Back in the 1700s, when you were in school…” and there are days when I look at the fantastic options available to learn Chinese today and it does indeed feel like I was in college hundreds of years ago.

My day job is keeping me far too busy to take Chinese back up again, but if it weren’t, I’d be reading books like the ones put out by our friends at Imagin8 Press.

They’ve got a nice new one called Easy to Read Chinese Short Stories composed of the Best Short Stories and Poems from the 2021 MSL Master Chinese Writing Contest, a Mandarin school in Hong Kong. It’s a collection of 17 very short stories and poems written in simplified Chinese using a total of just 320 different Chinese characters and also available as a free audiobook.

Early in 2021, Chinese learners worldwide were invited to participate in the first Chinese Writing Contest organized by MSL Master. Entries were limited to using 320 unique Chinese characters.  Out of 82 submissions, 17 of them were ranked the highest in a public vote on Twitter. These top-ranked works are included in this book. There are stories, poems, and even a short play.

At a time when the world seems far more fraught than it has been and when connections between people are all the more important, I love the statement they’ve got on their website:

We are dedicated to promoting a peaceful world by bridging the divide between different cultures. Our sole focus is on publishing high quality, enjoyable books for English speaking people who want to read and understand Chinese.

You can see their full list here. As a big reader, I really do believe that reading in Chinese helps language acquisition by leaps and bounds. Having books like this (which didn’t exist when I, or my kids, were first learning Chinese) really makes a difference.

From The Newark Post

By Matt Hooke mhooke@chespub.comJan 19, 2022

Plans for a two-story addition to Downes Elementary School in Newark, Deleware, which will add four classrooms to accommodate the growing Chinese immersion program, moved a bit closer to fruition last week when the Christina School Board approved construction documents for the project.

Due to inflation and supply chain issues increasing construction costs across the country, the project is estimated to cost $577,022 more than the initial $2.2 million estimate, Christina officials acknowledged last week. The base bid, which does not include additional HVAC, flooring or a repaving of the play area, is $143,364 over budget, according to information provided to the school board by the architecture firm.

George Wicks, supervisor of facilities and planning, said up to $100,000 left over from the renovations to the Christiana High School agricultural science classrooms can be used to help fund the Downes addition. The cost estimate also targets the median bid, so there will likely be contractors who offer to do the project for a cheaper cost, according to Wicks.

Please read more here.

The Asia Society’s National Chinese Language Conference is the premier conference for Chinese immersion educators. While there’s a lot about teaching Chinese in general, it’s the one conference that’s got a significant K-12 immersion track.

Which isn’t to diss the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages, or ACTFL, which is the other big language teacher conference. )And yes, if you’ve heard your program talk about ACTFL proficiency levels, this is where they come from.)

But NCLC is all Chinese all the time. You can see some of the workshops here:

It’s not really a conference for parents, but a great one for teachers and principals. Especially if they’re somewhat new to their positions, it can give a sense of what’s out there, what works best and how programs can up their game. I’ve always wanted to send a few school board members, just so they can see what immersion can really do….

In many public school districts, parents fundraise to send a Mandarin immersion staffer or two, who then come back and present the information to their colleges. However because of COVID, NCLC is now virtual, so it would be possible to give more teachers and administrators access. Early bird tickets are $150.

I’ll be moderating a panel on parent issues at the conference, but there’s no pay involved so I feel ok suggesting it.

Here’s a video about the conference:

And here’s one from the 2018 conference

And here’s the former Prime Minister of Australia, because why not?