You don’t see a headline like that on every Mandarin immersion post, do you?

But in this case, it’s warranted.

After 40 years of wandering around San Francisco, the nation’s oldest Mandarin immersion school is finally getting a forever home — in the spacious campus of a Catholic girls’ high school in San Francisco that closed at the end of the 2020-2021 academic year.

Mercy High School was build in 1952 for the Sisters of Mercy. Its fourth floor contained the order’s convent. After years of declining enrollment, the school closed last year. Many of the remaining students joined Riordan High School, a formerly all-boys Catholic high school which went co-ed in 2020.

There has been furious speculation in San Francisco over what private school could occupy space and on Monday, CAIS head Jeff Bissell emailed the school community to tell them that after a “rigorous process, CAIS was selected from a competitive field of schools” to purchase the property.

It’s not entirely a done deal. A purchase agreement has been signed but must now be reviewed by the Vatican, as is required for property owned by the Catholic Church.

Located in southwest quadrant of San Francisco, Bissell noted that the largest current CAIS classroom could fit inside the smallest classroom at the new campus.

San Francisco’s Chinese American International School was founded in 1981. Since then it’s had three different homes, first in rental basement space at a University of California extension building near downtown and later at the Presidio, a 1,500-acre park on a former military post on the way to the Golden Gate Bridge.

Since 1997 the main school has been housed in a former telephone company office building five blocks from San Francisco’s City Hall. CAIS shares the building with the French American International School and International High School. The CAIS preschool is five blocks away.

In 2016 the middle school moved to a building seven blocks in the other direction whichonce housed the Saint Paulus Lutheran Day School and later a community clinic. In 2012 the building was taken over by 75 Occupy SF protesters for a day.

The move to the Mercy campus, which Bissell says won’t begin until Fall of 2022 at the earliest, will allow the school to consolidate all its students in one place.

CAIS currently has 480 students, but the Mercy campus has been home to as many as 1,000, so it seems very likely the school will expand with time.

Parents of younger children won’t have heard about this so much, but it’s a growing movement in high schools nationwide. If your child graduates high school and can demonstrate proficiency in two or more languages, they can get a Seal of Biliteracy that includes a medal (in many states) a special seal on their diploma, a note in their transcript and a leg up in college.

What’s not to like?

These seals got their start in 2008 in California as a way for high schools to recognize students who are graduating high school with proficiency in two or more languages.

The idea was two-fold: to recognize students who had studied hard and really mastered a second language, and to acknowledge the work students coming from bilingual homes had to do to stay fluent in their home language and learn English.

As with many things when it comes to bilingualism, it’s a win-win situation.

Every year the United States government spends millions of dollars to teach people in the military, diplomats and other vital languages. Businesses spend millions looking for staff who speak useful languages. And students spend tens of thousands of dollars in college trying to learn languages.

And at the same time, far too many students who come from bilingual families spend their entire K – 12 school career learning English and forgetting critically useful languages like Russian, Chinese, Spanish, Korean, Vietnamese, Arabic and others.

The Seal of Biliteracy is a way for a state or school district to:

• Honor students who have gained proficiency in two or more languages
• Signal on their diploma and in their transcript that they have this proficiency
• Encourage students to learn or keep alive languages they already know

You can ask your high school or school district if they offer this program, or check out the national website to find out more here.

The requirements differ a little state from state, but generally during high school students must:

• Complete all English requirements with a grade of 2.0 or above.
• Pass the state high school graduation test, if there is one

And in addition, demonstrate their proficiency in the foreign language by one of these:

• Pass an AP exam in the foreign language with a score of 3 of higher
• Complete four years of a foreign languages with a score of 3.0 or higher
• Pass an International Baccalaureate exam in the language with a score of four or higher
• Pass the SAT II foreign language exam with a score of 600 or higher.

The seal is usually affixed to the student’s diploma and appears on their transcript.

Colleges take note of this and it’s something the student can discuss in their college applications and also point out to employers.

Sky Kids will have Mandarin immersion summer camps in San Francisco this summer and it’s looking like Taiwan as well, though that remains to be seen. Note that both are day camps so you’ve got to be in the area or have friends your child can stay with.

Sky Kids Summer 2021 Camp Update

From the director:

After the 2020 pause and this year’s improving Covid situation, we think it will be a good time to run our in-person Mandarin camps in Summer 2021. The period will be July 19-August 13, which is 4 weeks of camps with 4 different Maker & Art themes. Unfortunately, due to space and manpower limitations, we will be launching morning half-days first. Should we be able to offer afternoons as well, we will update you accordingly.

Please check online for details regarding the program:  www.sky-kids.org/mandarin-camps-summer-2021

We will also be continuing our Online Mandarin classes in the earlier part of the summer: June 7-July 16 or if you prefer hosting an at-home mini-camp for a small group of students (e.g. 4-6) we can provide teachers & materials for this time period as well.

It’s with a heavy heart that I write this. The murders in Atlanta are fresh in everyone’s minds and this weekend there will be Asian solidarity marches and celebrations across the country.

For those of us with children in Chinese immersion programs, this is hitting especially hard. Many of our families are Asian themselves, others have spent years immersing themselves in Chinese and Chinese-American culture as our children learn Chinese in school.

I think the first thing we can do is check in with people and ask how they’re doing. This week I’ve heard stories of people being spit upon, screamed at from cars, followed on the sidewalk while being yelled at and verbally assaulted simply for being Asian in America.

Despicable words about Chinese people were spray painted on the walls of my children’s middle school.

One mom was out shopping and picked something up then put it down. Another woman yelled out “Where’s the hand sanitizer? I’m not going to touch that, that *** just touched it.” With her children standing right next to her.

For those of us who are white, hearing these stories and realizing what our Asian friends deal with that is invisible to us is important. We can become allies and stand against such hatred. Though we must remember that it’s not our friends’ job to educate us about what’s happening, it is our own.

One thing I’ve long been saddened by is the lack of teaching in Mandarin immersion schools about this history of Asians in the United States and especially the history of Chinese Americans. Our kids read books about the Spring Festival and red envelopes, but don’t learn about the Chinese Exclusion Act or the shameful history of anti-Chinese mob attacks and murders on the West Coast.

In my hometown of Seattle, rioters attacked, killed and forced hundreds of Chinese workers to leave town in 1886, something I didn’t even learn about when I studied Chinese at the University of Washington.

So this spring, instead of only having your kids read books about Chinese culture, perhaps add in a few about American Chinese culture and history.

Here are a couple of good places to start:

Top 10 Chinese American Children’s Books (ages 2 – 14)

Best Children’s Books about Chinese American History

Asian American Children’s Books

And for anyone looking for a project: There’s a real need for a book for middle or high school students about the history of the Chinese Exclusion Act and what it did to the Chinese American community. There are a few good adult books on this, including At America’s Gates: Chinese Immigration during the Exclusion Era, 1882-1943, but they’re too academic for kids.

The Act, passed in 1882, barred almost all Chinese from the United States for ten years. It was the first federal law that banned a group of people solely on the basis of race or nationality set a precedent for future restrictions against Asian immigrants and others.

Forty-two years later the 1924 Immigration Act excluded all classes of Chinese immigrants. It wasn’t until Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965 that these racist quota systems were abolished.

Guest post by Craig Watts

Utah has over 16,000 students in Chinese dual-language immersion programs, and its first cohort of K-12 students is now finishing their senior year in high school. At this critical juncture, Utah parents have formed Utah Mandarin Families, a statewide parent network to support Chinese learning and to brainstorm Chinese-related career paths.

In its first month, Utah Mandarin Families has launched a Facebook Group, advocated in support of the Confucius Institute, started a parent/school snapshot series, and recorded a video interview with Mandarin Immersion Parent Council blog writer Elizabeth Weise.  

Utah is the only state in the US that administers dual-language immersion at the state-level, so it makes sense for parents to organize at the state level as well. At a time when districts and schools are pulling back on support for trips to China and extracurriculars, UtahMandarin Families aims to function like a “parallel PTA” supporting extracurricular Chinese learning, organizing trips, and exploring China-related internships and careers.  

Chinese dual-language immersion programs first launched in Utah in 2009 and are now offered at 33 elementary schools. 

Utah Chinese immersion students typically pass the AP Chinese exam in 9th grade, and then move into the Bridge Program, where university-level courses are offered at high schools. Students take 3-credit language classes in grades 10-12, earning up to 9 hours of college credit upon high school graduation. 

Utah Mandarin Families aims to:

• Providing opportunities to learn and apply Chinese beyond the classroom
• Build connections with Chinese people on all levels: personal, family, school, state, educational, cultural, business/career
• Help guide the development of the Utah Mandarin Dual Language Immersion (DLI) program
• Identify and better leverage China-related partners and resources in education, business and government
• Brainstorm China-related college and career paths including study abroad programs, internships, and non-profit opportunities

For more information on Utah Mandarin Families, please reach out to Craig Watts at cragunwatts [at] gmail.com

A nice article about a mom going to Beijing with her Mandarin-immersion educated daughter, pre-pandemic.

The Chinese Lessons

By Jill Bronfman

People told me that my daughter was fluent in Chinese, but before we went to Beijing together I used to have to take their word for it. She had been in a Mandarin immersion program since she was three years old, but since I didn’t speak Mandarin myself, I had to be satisfied with the occasional school speech or compliment from a fellow parent who did speak the language. The opportunity to test this abstract theory of bilingualism in the field presented itself in May when I was asked to speak about the development of artificial intelligence in educational technology in Beijing. I decided to bring my daughter with me as travel companion, translator, and wing woman.

The last time I went to Beijing, I was the same age as my daughter was on this trip, but so much had changed for sixteen-year-old girls, and so much had changed in China. I thought I was worldly, but my world was small. Today, China is a vivid juxtaposition of impenetrable technology and touchable antiquity. Today, a teenager is full of WeChat and snarky memes that she has to explain to me.

Please read more here.

A lovely piece by a woman who grew up Mandarin-speaking in the United States, lost her Mandarin and then found it again when she had children. And always nice to have one of my Mandarin immersion articles linked to in the New York Times. Due to the COVID lockdown I haven’t done a 2020 “State of Mandarin Immersion” article, but I’ll try to put one together in the next month or so. I fear we’ve lost some schools but haven’t had time to go through all the links I’ve collected. And I know we’ve added a few, so hopefully we’re still up above 300.

Connecting My Children to Their Heritage in Mandarin

Although my parents’ English is serviceable, it is only in Mandarin that they’re at ease, that they can inhabit their own skins.

New York Times

By Connie Chang

• Feb. 12, 2021

On Sunday afternoons, my grandfather would sit by my elbow while I gripped his prized calligraphy brush, tracing inky lines on tissue-thin paper. “Many Chinese consider calligraphy a high form of art,” my grandfather reminded me whenever my attention flagged or arm drooped.

I’d sigh in response — this weekly ritual just felt like more school.

Growing up as a child of first-generation Chinese immigrants, I was used to straddling two worlds — that of my parents and the country they emigrated from, and America, where the pressure to assimilate buffeted us constantly. The message was clear in the media and popular culture of the 1980s: It was better to speak English, exclusively and without an accent; to replace thermoses of dumplings with hamburgers. My father’s college classmate, also a Chinese immigrant, proudly boasted that his kids knew no Mandarin, a claim confirmed when his son butchered the pronunciation of his own name while my parents looked on with unconcealed horror.

My parents, instead, dug in their heels against this powerful wave that threatened to wash out the distinctive features of their past. I spoke no English until I started preschool, but in Mandarin — according to my grandmother — I was a sparkling conversationalist, a Dorothy Parker of the toddler set. The school administrators wrung their hands, worried that I’d fall behind, but my father shrugged, figuring (correctly) that I’d learn English quickly enough.

Please read more here.