Dual Language Program in Albany

By: Jason Moreno

December 3, 2007 — Today, Spanish is a major language in the United States. The Dual Language program has a vision to prepare children in grades K through 5 for success in the 21 st century.

The Dual Language program is the only program in the Capital Region that dedicates itself to bilingual education. Located right off of Delaware Avenue, the program has now found its permanent home at the Delaware Community School. The closest programs are located in Syracuse and New Rochelle.

As of right now there isn’t another program such as this one in the Albany area which caters to bilingual students. Other schools only offer ESL programs, which sometimes fail to prepare students to integrate into their new school system.

Melanie Pores, Director of the Dual Language program, has had this vision for many years. After years of planning, grant proposals, and visiting other programs all around New York, Pores began the first program in the Capital Region in the late fall of 1999 with only two classes.

The staff at the Delaware Community School is made up of professionals who are from Ecuador, Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, Peru and the United States.

In order for children to be prepared for success, instructional time is divided between learning in Spanish and learning in English. Classes are integrated to promote cultural and linguistic exchanges among classmates.

One volunteer at the Delaware Community School is Courtney Fish, an education major with a minor in Spanish at The College of Saint Rose. Fish

explained that there is one dual-language classroom per grade. In the dual-language classrooms students are taught in an alternating schedule of English one day and Spanish the next.

“I want the kids to learn more about vocabulary, and communication skills rather than worry about grammar,” Pores said. In her fifth grade class, most students did not speak any Spanish when they first entered the Dual Language program, but now they are fluent.

Zorhayma Teresa Colon is the mother of two students who are in the Dual Language program. Both daughters Edith and Leah have been in the program since grade K. Colon spoke of her youngest, Leah, who entered kindergarten in September, and now can carry conversations with her grandparents who speak Spanish only.

“Since their minds are so fresh, they are open to receive and absorb all the information and knowledge,” Teresa Colon said. Colon also feels that the program is an excellent way to reconnect her children with their Dominican roots.

In order to attend the Dual Language Enrichment program, students must live in the city limits of Albany.

“Unfortunately we have to turn parents down, who come from other towns,” said Pores, director of the program.

Politics has limited the accessibility of the program. The topic of bilingual education is political in the Capital Region. Although there isn’t a large Hispanic population in Albany, there is still a need for this program. Maria Neira, Vice President of NYSUT, holds a strong opinion on the Dual Language program.

“This is a really good program, it is unfortunate that it faces so much trouble with funding, due to the small demographic of the Hispanic population,” Neira said.

“In a nation where the minority is now the majority, it is needed now more than ever for our children to be bilingual and bicultural,” Neira said.

New York University graduate student Robert Tolson is a perfect example of a student being bilingual and bicultural. Tolson is African American and Jamaican, but was raised by Gladys Torres, his Puerto Rican neighbor as a young boy.

“I learned Spanish, once I learned how to speak, it’s amazing how much you pick up on things when you’re a kid,” Tolson said.

Tolson was fluent in Spanish by the age of five, and is now learning French. Tolson believes that if someone is bilingual they have a better chance of landing a job than someone who isn’t due to the high demand of people who know more than one language.

“You can never learn too many languages,” Tolson said.

As of right now the program only goes up to the fifth grade. Within the upcoming years, the program may reach middle school and high school. Parents can find out about this program by going to www.Albanyschools.org. It’s the only Dual Language program on the website.