Tuckahoe Parents Take Case for Foreign Language Program to County Board

A group of Tuckahoe Elementary parents who have organized in an attempt to bring foreign language instruction to their children's school have begun taking their case to the Arlington County Board.

Eight Arlington elementary schools, including Tuckahoe, feed students into Swanson Middle School. Of those, Tuckahoe, Taylor and Arlington Science Focus do not have a Foreign Language in Elementary Schools, or FLES, program. The others do.

Parents have pleaded with the Arlington School Board to fund the program at Tuckahoe — a $450,000 proposition — on the basis that their children are at a disadvantage when they get to middle school because their classmates have had more foreign language instruction. A large part of their argument centers on the inequity of certain children getting exposure to foreign language at a young age while others who end up at the same middle school do not.

Kelly Alexis, one of the parents, delivered a petition with more than 115 signatures to the school board earlier this month.

"We are hopeful that the board will do the right thing," Alexis told Patch on Sunday. "Because continuing to not implement FLES… is just widening the gap."

The school board has put together a $524.5 million proposed budget for next year that restores several positions Superintendent Pat Murphy had recommended cutting — a spending plan that assumes the county will grant the school system an extra half-cent tax increase, which isn't for sure.

But neither the school board nor Murphy have proposed spending the money necessary to bring the FLES program to Tuckahoe. Murphy has listed expanding the program as an "unfunded investment."

"Right now, I'm not seeing it, given the current budget climate," Murphy told Patch last week. "Things always change, though."

Parents have been trying to get FLES at Tuckahoe for years — for so long, some who initially worked on the effort now have children at Swanson Middle.

Several parents sat through more than two hours of a board meeting earlier this month in order to testify to the need for FLES at Tuckahoe. They talked about the frustration and discouragement their children felt at not being able to keep up with their classmates and, generally, about the inequity of the current arrangement.

The Tuckahoe PTA has formed a committee to explore the matter. One of the parents involved in this effort has begun trying to set up a meeting with Arlington County Board Chairman Walter Tejada to discuss the matter, Alexis said.

"I want to be optimistic," said Alexis, who has a second-grader at Tuckahoe and a rising kindergartner. "I'm not going to give up. We can't give up. There's got to be a way. You just can't keep another year going where nothing happens."

The Arlington County Board will formally adopt its 2014 budget on Saturday, and many of the more substantive decisions on the spending plan will likely be discussed at a Tuesday afternoon work session. The board's decision will ultimately determine the financial reality that the school system has to deal with.

Parents began emailing the following letter to Arlington County Board members late last week:

Dear Arlington County Board,

I am among a group of over 100 Arlington parents who seek funding to bring the FLES (Foreign Language in the Elementary Schools) program to Tuckahoe Elementary School.  As you know, a majority of elementary schools in Arlington have this essential curriculum that ensures a proficiency in foreign language for children and exposes them to other cultures, while also, according to over 40 years of research, encouraging brain development and leading to improved performance in other subjects.  Parents have been told by the Arlington County School Board that funding "is not likely" to expand FLES to Tuckahoe or any other elementary school in Arlington in the 2013-14 school year.  According to Superintendent Murphy’s current budget, the cost of FLES is a relatively modest $450,000 per school.  We are aware that the Arlington County Board has the flexibility to grant the School Board additional funds that could be used to expand FLES and to ensure a better educational experience for all Arlington children in other areas as well.  We ask that the County Board address the inequity in foreign language learning in Arlington presented by the underfunding of the FLES program, and put all children in Arlington on an equal footing towards equal instructional time, foreign language proficiency and all the cultural and educational benefits it provides.

Link to our recently created petition: http://www.change.org/petitions/arlington-county-school-board-arlington-va-implement-foreign-language-in-the-elementary-schools-fles-at-tuckahoe

We look forward to hearing from you on this matter.

The Arlington School Board will hold a second hearing on its proposed budget at 7:30 p.m. Thursday.