This is a major issue in the state of Texas. Aside from the costs of remedial courses for incoming college students we should be concerned with how these findings place scrutiny on the [standardized] curriculum many Texas high school students receive, which I think may speak to Romer's ending comment that this curriculum does set the expectations low and bases college-readiness on test performance.
Check out the full report Diploma to Nowhere.
-Patricia
Teacher Magazine
September 15, 2008
It's a tough lesson for millions of students just now arriving on campus: even if you have a high school diploma, you may not be ready for college.
In fact, a new study calculates, one-third of American college students have to enroll in remedial classes. The bill to colleges and taxpayers for trying to bring them up to speed on material they were supposed to learn in high school comes to between $2.3 billion and $2.9 billion annually.
"That is a very large cost, but there is an additional cost and that's the cost to the students," said former Colorado governor Roy Romer, chair of the group Strong American Schools, which is issuing the report "Diploma to Nowhere" on Monday. "These students come out of high school really misled. They think they're prepared. They got a 3.0 and got through the curriculum they needed to get admitted, but they find what they learned wasn't adequate."
Christina Jeronimo was an "A'' student in high school English, but was placed in a remedial course when she arrived at Long Beach Community College in California. The course was valuable in some ways but frustrating and time-consuming. Now in her third year of community college, she'd hoped to transfer to UCLA by now.
Like many college students, she wishes she'd been worked a little harder in high school.
"There's a gap," said Jeronimo, who hopes to study psychology. "The demands of the high school teachers aren't as great as the demands for college. Sometimes they just baby us."
The problem of colleges devoting huge amounts of time and money to remediation isn't new, though its scale and cost has been difficult to measure. The latest report gives somewhat larger estimates than some previous studies, though it is not out of line with trends suggested in others, said Hunter Boylan, an expert at Appalachian State University in North Carolina, who was not connected with the report.
Analyzing federal data, the report estimates 43 percent of community college students require remediation, as do 29 percent of students at public four-year universities, with higher numbers in some places. For instance, four in five Oklahoma community college students need remedial coursework, and three in five in the giant California State university system need help in English, math or both.
The cost per student runs to as much as $2,000 per student in community colleges and $2,500 in four-year universities.
Jeronimo was hardly alone at Long Beach Community College, where 95 percent of students need remedial coursework, according to President Eloy Oakley.
"It's the number one issue to Long Beach City College and the entire California community college system, easily," Oakley said. "I don't believe that the public in general really understands the magnitude of the problem."
Simply dumping the remedial students into large classes isn't necessarily expensive for colleges, although it's also not very effective. But smaller classes typically require more attention and money. Some states have refused to fund remedial courses at the university level. In California, Oakley said, state funding for community colleges favors credit courses. Remediation (or "basic skills" as he and many educators call it) is typically noncredit.
Educators are working to improve remedial courses. Long Beach is developing "success areas" that give extra time and attention to students. Community colleges in Tennessee have completely redesigned giant introductory and remedial courses where many students were struggling.
Boylan says colleges are learning such courses must also teach study skills to be effective.
Indeed, students often report that the hardest aspect of the transition to college isn't the material. It's the new rhythm and structure of college-level work.
"One of the things that they don't teach in high school is time management," Jeronimo said.
Eric Paris, who earned a 3.8 high school GPA but is finding his freshman year at Virginia Tech much more challenging, says the big difference is "it's all on my own." In class, "it's up to me if I want to sit on Facebook or pay attention." He, too, wishes he'd taken more challenging high school classes but thought a high GPA was more important.
Boylan says the gap between what high schools teach and what colleges expect isn't the only problem. He says there's often a mismatch, with high schools and colleges teaching material in different ways.
It's true that only recently have K-12 and higher education begun talking seriously about aligning standards. But Romer, who has also headed the Los Angeles Unified School District, doesn't buy that it's a communication problem.
"We're not expecting enough of our youngsters and the institutions that train them," he said.
Sunday, October 12, 2008
Winning the Fight of Our Lives: Immigrant Rights and Prison-Industrial Complex
This is a very important and informative article/ reflection.
-Patricia
Monica Garcia| LACCCENTER
October 9, 2008
If the immigrant rights movement doesn’t understand raids, detention, and deportation in the context of the greater prison-industrial complex, and organize accordingly, we will lose the fight of our lives - a fight we can and must win.
During the immigration debates and protests of 2006-2007, a small but significant chorus of organizations - those working with families facing deportation - spoke out strongly against many of the immigration reform legislative proposals. What many in the beltway where calling “Comprehensive Immigration Reform” (CIR) wasn’t comprehensive enough to fix the detention and deportation system that had eaten up and spit out almost two million people and destroyed nearly as many families. Instead, the grand bargain for reform was to allow for stricter immigration enforcement in exchange for a normalized status for some undocumented immigrant workers.
In the limited scope of those debates, the primary contention was whether that normalized status would lead to green cards (legalization) or not for those immigrant guest workers. It seemed the folks in the beltway, some dear friends of ours, felt the need to concede the anti-immigrant forces’ thirst for more enforcement in order to obtain some semblance of legalization. However, it seemed the survivors of immigration enforcement - families facing deportation and families affected by the deaths and militarization of the border - were being made into sacrificial lambs for an elusive blessing of legalization riddled with unwanted curses.
Our intentions weren’t based solely on self-interest. Fighting for justice for our brothers and sisters that died in detention, for our children that had lost parents to deportation, and for our families whose sole income provider suffered the desert terrain alongside the border wasn’t a trivial struggle. But like our colleagues backing CIR, we were also fighting for the future of immigrant communities.
Emerging apartheid
At that time, I wrote in Left Turn about the fight of our lives. Back then, my colleagues and I had highlighted to our friends in the immigrant rights movement that we were witnessing the emergence of immigrant apartheid in the US. A system was developing that would systematically criminalize and attack immigrants’ lives as people of color and working people. This emerging apartheid would use the criminal justice-, prison-, and deportation systems - and any other system - at its disposal to make lives of immigrants - both legal and undocumented - as hard as possible. What we would see, whether we won reform or not, would be more arrests, more raids, more detentions, and more deportations. In sum, more destruction of our communities.
Many people in the mainstream of the immigrant rights movement thought that we were blowing things out of proportion. Some mocked our characterization of what was happening to immigrants as “apartheid.” Some allies had labeled our work against deportation, detention, and the excesses of the criminal justice system as “boutique issues” - sexy, but not as substantive as the fight for legalization. Others were far too enchanted with portraying immigrants as hardworking and law-abiding. They saw nothing wrong with focusing the ire of immigration enforcement on the “bad” immigrants nor saw anything cynical about alluding to rights as something that “good” immigrants deserve.
They sure as hell weren’t going to sacrifice a potential win just to benefit the “bad” immigrants, namely - those in the deportation- and criminal justice systems. We would keep insisting, in vain it seemed, that this fight had to be about more than just green cards in an era where green cards were losing their significance. It also had to be about more than the “good” immigrants in an era where the “good” immigrants could easily be recast as “bad.”
We were speaking from experience. We had seen how the FBI had taken a young hardworking legal immigrant and pizza deliverer named Anser Mahmood and recast him, first, as a suspected terrorist. When that didn’t work, the small financial assistance he gave to immigrant friends was defined as “alien smuggling,” making him a criminal alien and mandatorily deportable to Pakistan, despite the pleas from his own upstate New York neighbors and over a dozen members of Congress. We had seen US Army veteran and legal immigrant Warren Joseph’s post traumatic stress from the first Gulf War cause him to run afoul of the law and into an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center for three years, facing deportation to Trinidad. We had seen post-September 11 raids tear apart the lives of over 1500 working families from South Asia and the Middle East under the guise of the “war on terror.”
The anti-immigrant far Right (and not-so-far Right) had no such illusions of a difference between “good” and “bad” immigrants. They talked openly about a “war of attrition” against immigrants. Late night pundits like Pat Buchanan talked candidly and favorably about going after all unwanted immigrants under the guise of going after the “worst.” Those of us that had worked with families facing deportation for the past decade understood this strategy.
Movement miscalculation
A major miscalculation of some of the immigrant rights movement was the assessment that the immigration system was attacking only immigrants and their undocumented status. So once immigrants had their papers - a path to legalization not to be confused with actual legalization - they would be fine. This ignores the fact that the value of a green card had diminished since the passage of 1996 so-called reforms. It also ignores the fact that many of the aforementioned immigrants still lead their lives as low-income immigrants of color.
Many of our friends in the immigrant rights movement simply couldn’t see that the forces creating apartheid against immigrants were also attacking the ideas and institutions of immigrants - those that allowed them to rise above subsistence (in some cases flourish) -as much as they where attacking immigrants and their status. In the process immigrants - and the ideas and institutions of their everyday lives - were being criminalized. This criminalization had become far easier in a period marked by “wars” on drugs, “wars” on terror, and other “wars” meant to have an elusive target and a beginning with no end.
Some of us had the blessing of knowing elders that fought for civil rights, and those who carried the struggle beyond civil rights, to the Black liberation movement. Historical reflection impressed something upon us. Just maybe, for all the rhetorical linkages that the immigrant rights movement drew with the Civil Rights movement, we failed to see what happened in the Black community after the peak of the Civil Rights movement.
The victories of integration were followed by an explosion in the prison system and mass incarceration in the Black community. Communities that survived poll tests, poll taxes, and grandfather clauses to preserve their right to vote were processed through the criminal justice system only to be disenfranchised again. The vibrant businesses and civic associations that endured decades of Jim Crow would be replaced by extreme capital flight and a criminalized informal sector - a criminalized political economy. What the Civil Rights struggle forced the government to give back to Black folks through the narrative of its “best” (Rosa Parks, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, etc.) the government would later take by pushing narratives of the Black community at its “worst.”
Open eyes
Hindsight is only 20/20 when our eyes are open. The difference between that period and this period is that the clues of what was next for the Black community were not as readily available to our Freedom Fighters of that era. President Nixon’s crime strategy, as he articulated behind closed doors, was to direct the criminal justice system primarily at the Black community without publicly saying so. This only became public knowledge after one of Nixon’s closest aides’ personal experiences with the prison system exposed him to its evils.
By comparison, the blueprint criminalizing immigrants was made readily available to the public. The much-touted and hated Sensenbrenner-King bill of 2005-2006, which passed the House of Representatives, left little encrypted in its desire for wholesale criminalization of immigrant communities. Even earlier, plans like the quickly-recanted “PATRIOT Act II,” crafted in 2002 by then-Attorney General John Ashcroft, proposed to criminalize the very way immigrants made their livings and lived their lives.
During the Civil Rights movement, there was a whole chorus of Freedom Fighters that cried that the struggle couldn’t just be about integration. The expansion of the prison-industrial complex in the Black community and its subsequent “wars” (on drugs, for example) was that era’s tragic “We told you so.” In 2006, many of us were screaming, “This can’t just be about green cards!” The expansion of ICE raids was our tragic “We told you so.”
On May 12, 2008, ICE agents arrested 389 workers during a raid at the Agriprocessors Inc meat packing plant in Postville, Iowa. Within weeks, nearly 300 mostly-Latino workers were criminally charged by federal prosecutors with crimes ranging from identity theft to illegal entry. Where a typical ICE raid would result in mostly administrative immigration charges, these workers were railroaded through federal criminal court receiving up to six month sentences in federal prison. In dramatic fashion, ICE instantly made this group of immigrant workers criminal aliens - the “bad” immigrants.
We felt no satisfaction when government tactics confirmed our worst fears. No one wants to be right or prophetic when predicting the destruction of our communities. However, we were taken by surprise by the response from the previously conservative mainstream of our movement. People that would have never been open to understanding the injustices of the criminal justice system and the deportation process saw clearly the need to tackle these systems with a newfound vigor. Over and over again, we would see new voices in immigrant communities come out and say, “Let us fight for legalization, but let us fight for more than legalization.” Organizers and activists that have rarely spoken publicly about a family member’s incarceration or deportation are coming forward. Old adversaries are talking about strategies to tackle the deportation system.
Movement blueprint
Predicting the emergence of immigrant apartheid is far easier than identifying how a movement can defeat it. But individuals and organizers around the country are developing the blueprint for how we may begin to win.
1) We must make this bigger than green cards. We are fighting for the future of our communities. We cannot act like the path to legalization is a path flowing with milk and honey. It is a necessary step in a path towards a greater vision of social justice.
2) We must focus on building power in immigrant communities. Organizers such as Juan Pablo Chávez of the Florida Immigrant Coalition have instructed us at great length on the need to organize rather than mobilize. We cannot be a movement of mobilizations and talking heads. We must build real leaders in real communities to bring about real change.
3) We must organize in immigrant communities most directly impacted. We must stop talking about “good” and “bad” immigrants and build with those most affected. This is the only way to build a movement with more depth. Families that have survived the prison-industrial complex are not sob stories and charity cases; they are individuals that have survived one of the most sophisticated systems this society has for marginalizing someone. Their knowledge and determination makes our movement stronger. New organizations such as Deported Diaspora in Boston, new organizers such as Luisanna Santibanez in Austin, Texas, and older yet formidable organizations such as Homies Unidos in Los Angeles, and Families For Freedom in New York continue to dedicate their time to building in the most impacted communities. More efforts like this have to be incubated and supported.
4) We must build the capacity of grassroots organizations to create the solutions to their own problems. Policies in the beltway must be grounded in the wisdom and intellect of communities on the ground. But that can only happen when immigrant communities develop the faith and the capacity to create those solutions. Otherwise, solutions in the beltway will be made for immigrants, not by immigrants.
5) We must identify the ideas and institutions in immigrant communities that we need to protect, and protect them vigorously. The things that enable a detainee to represent himself and win his freedom, or enable an immigrant family to survive the desert and support family on two continents are the same things that will enable us to build real alternatives to the world we live in today. When we forsake what our communities have already built, we forsake our real power.
6) We must confront the Department of Homeland Security more directly. From Hurricane Katrina, to the ICE raids, to corrupt agents along the border, the Department of Homeland Security has survived numerous investigations and audits only see its budget increase even more. If we don’t find more creative and strategic ways to confront ICE, we will see even more destruction of our communities and have no one else to blame.
Recently, I spoke with a family friend, a young Caribbean woman whose husband was detained by ICE. Nearly everyone had told her that her husband would be deported. Despite this, through her persistence, he was released a month after being detained. On the way home from picking him up she told me “I said my prayers and knew if I fought hard enough, I would see us together again.” With that spirit, I know that if we fight smart and fight hard, our communities, our families, and our loved ones will win this fight.
Author: Subhash Kateel, 08 Oct. 2009, Source: LeftTurn
-Patricia
Monica Garcia| LACCCENTER
October 9, 2008
If the immigrant rights movement doesn’t understand raids, detention, and deportation in the context of the greater prison-industrial complex, and organize accordingly, we will lose the fight of our lives - a fight we can and must win.
During the immigration debates and protests of 2006-2007, a small but significant chorus of organizations - those working with families facing deportation - spoke out strongly against many of the immigration reform legislative proposals. What many in the beltway where calling “Comprehensive Immigration Reform” (CIR) wasn’t comprehensive enough to fix the detention and deportation system that had eaten up and spit out almost two million people and destroyed nearly as many families. Instead, the grand bargain for reform was to allow for stricter immigration enforcement in exchange for a normalized status for some undocumented immigrant workers.
In the limited scope of those debates, the primary contention was whether that normalized status would lead to green cards (legalization) or not for those immigrant guest workers. It seemed the folks in the beltway, some dear friends of ours, felt the need to concede the anti-immigrant forces’ thirst for more enforcement in order to obtain some semblance of legalization. However, it seemed the survivors of immigration enforcement - families facing deportation and families affected by the deaths and militarization of the border - were being made into sacrificial lambs for an elusive blessing of legalization riddled with unwanted curses.
Our intentions weren’t based solely on self-interest. Fighting for justice for our brothers and sisters that died in detention, for our children that had lost parents to deportation, and for our families whose sole income provider suffered the desert terrain alongside the border wasn’t a trivial struggle. But like our colleagues backing CIR, we were also fighting for the future of immigrant communities.
Emerging apartheid
At that time, I wrote in Left Turn about the fight of our lives. Back then, my colleagues and I had highlighted to our friends in the immigrant rights movement that we were witnessing the emergence of immigrant apartheid in the US. A system was developing that would systematically criminalize and attack immigrants’ lives as people of color and working people. This emerging apartheid would use the criminal justice-, prison-, and deportation systems - and any other system - at its disposal to make lives of immigrants - both legal and undocumented - as hard as possible. What we would see, whether we won reform or not, would be more arrests, more raids, more detentions, and more deportations. In sum, more destruction of our communities.
Many people in the mainstream of the immigrant rights movement thought that we were blowing things out of proportion. Some mocked our characterization of what was happening to immigrants as “apartheid.” Some allies had labeled our work against deportation, detention, and the excesses of the criminal justice system as “boutique issues” - sexy, but not as substantive as the fight for legalization. Others were far too enchanted with portraying immigrants as hardworking and law-abiding. They saw nothing wrong with focusing the ire of immigration enforcement on the “bad” immigrants nor saw anything cynical about alluding to rights as something that “good” immigrants deserve.
They sure as hell weren’t going to sacrifice a potential win just to benefit the “bad” immigrants, namely - those in the deportation- and criminal justice systems. We would keep insisting, in vain it seemed, that this fight had to be about more than just green cards in an era where green cards were losing their significance. It also had to be about more than the “good” immigrants in an era where the “good” immigrants could easily be recast as “bad.”
We were speaking from experience. We had seen how the FBI had taken a young hardworking legal immigrant and pizza deliverer named Anser Mahmood and recast him, first, as a suspected terrorist. When that didn’t work, the small financial assistance he gave to immigrant friends was defined as “alien smuggling,” making him a criminal alien and mandatorily deportable to Pakistan, despite the pleas from his own upstate New York neighbors and over a dozen members of Congress. We had seen US Army veteran and legal immigrant Warren Joseph’s post traumatic stress from the first Gulf War cause him to run afoul of the law and into an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center for three years, facing deportation to Trinidad. We had seen post-September 11 raids tear apart the lives of over 1500 working families from South Asia and the Middle East under the guise of the “war on terror.”
The anti-immigrant far Right (and not-so-far Right) had no such illusions of a difference between “good” and “bad” immigrants. They talked openly about a “war of attrition” against immigrants. Late night pundits like Pat Buchanan talked candidly and favorably about going after all unwanted immigrants under the guise of going after the “worst.” Those of us that had worked with families facing deportation for the past decade understood this strategy.
Movement miscalculation
A major miscalculation of some of the immigrant rights movement was the assessment that the immigration system was attacking only immigrants and their undocumented status. So once immigrants had their papers - a path to legalization not to be confused with actual legalization - they would be fine. This ignores the fact that the value of a green card had diminished since the passage of 1996 so-called reforms. It also ignores the fact that many of the aforementioned immigrants still lead their lives as low-income immigrants of color.
Many of our friends in the immigrant rights movement simply couldn’t see that the forces creating apartheid against immigrants were also attacking the ideas and institutions of immigrants - those that allowed them to rise above subsistence (in some cases flourish) -as much as they where attacking immigrants and their status. In the process immigrants - and the ideas and institutions of their everyday lives - were being criminalized. This criminalization had become far easier in a period marked by “wars” on drugs, “wars” on terror, and other “wars” meant to have an elusive target and a beginning with no end.
Some of us had the blessing of knowing elders that fought for civil rights, and those who carried the struggle beyond civil rights, to the Black liberation movement. Historical reflection impressed something upon us. Just maybe, for all the rhetorical linkages that the immigrant rights movement drew with the Civil Rights movement, we failed to see what happened in the Black community after the peak of the Civil Rights movement.
The victories of integration were followed by an explosion in the prison system and mass incarceration in the Black community. Communities that survived poll tests, poll taxes, and grandfather clauses to preserve their right to vote were processed through the criminal justice system only to be disenfranchised again. The vibrant businesses and civic associations that endured decades of Jim Crow would be replaced by extreme capital flight and a criminalized informal sector - a criminalized political economy. What the Civil Rights struggle forced the government to give back to Black folks through the narrative of its “best” (Rosa Parks, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, etc.) the government would later take by pushing narratives of the Black community at its “worst.”
Open eyes
Hindsight is only 20/20 when our eyes are open. The difference between that period and this period is that the clues of what was next for the Black community were not as readily available to our Freedom Fighters of that era. President Nixon’s crime strategy, as he articulated behind closed doors, was to direct the criminal justice system primarily at the Black community without publicly saying so. This only became public knowledge after one of Nixon’s closest aides’ personal experiences with the prison system exposed him to its evils.
By comparison, the blueprint criminalizing immigrants was made readily available to the public. The much-touted and hated Sensenbrenner-King bill of 2005-2006, which passed the House of Representatives, left little encrypted in its desire for wholesale criminalization of immigrant communities. Even earlier, plans like the quickly-recanted “PATRIOT Act II,” crafted in 2002 by then-Attorney General John Ashcroft, proposed to criminalize the very way immigrants made their livings and lived their lives.
During the Civil Rights movement, there was a whole chorus of Freedom Fighters that cried that the struggle couldn’t just be about integration. The expansion of the prison-industrial complex in the Black community and its subsequent “wars” (on drugs, for example) was that era’s tragic “We told you so.” In 2006, many of us were screaming, “This can’t just be about green cards!” The expansion of ICE raids was our tragic “We told you so.”
On May 12, 2008, ICE agents arrested 389 workers during a raid at the Agriprocessors Inc meat packing plant in Postville, Iowa. Within weeks, nearly 300 mostly-Latino workers were criminally charged by federal prosecutors with crimes ranging from identity theft to illegal entry. Where a typical ICE raid would result in mostly administrative immigration charges, these workers were railroaded through federal criminal court receiving up to six month sentences in federal prison. In dramatic fashion, ICE instantly made this group of immigrant workers criminal aliens - the “bad” immigrants.
We felt no satisfaction when government tactics confirmed our worst fears. No one wants to be right or prophetic when predicting the destruction of our communities. However, we were taken by surprise by the response from the previously conservative mainstream of our movement. People that would have never been open to understanding the injustices of the criminal justice system and the deportation process saw clearly the need to tackle these systems with a newfound vigor. Over and over again, we would see new voices in immigrant communities come out and say, “Let us fight for legalization, but let us fight for more than legalization.” Organizers and activists that have rarely spoken publicly about a family member’s incarceration or deportation are coming forward. Old adversaries are talking about strategies to tackle the deportation system.
Movement blueprint
Predicting the emergence of immigrant apartheid is far easier than identifying how a movement can defeat it. But individuals and organizers around the country are developing the blueprint for how we may begin to win.
1) We must make this bigger than green cards. We are fighting for the future of our communities. We cannot act like the path to legalization is a path flowing with milk and honey. It is a necessary step in a path towards a greater vision of social justice.
2) We must focus on building power in immigrant communities. Organizers such as Juan Pablo Chávez of the Florida Immigrant Coalition have instructed us at great length on the need to organize rather than mobilize. We cannot be a movement of mobilizations and talking heads. We must build real leaders in real communities to bring about real change.
3) We must organize in immigrant communities most directly impacted. We must stop talking about “good” and “bad” immigrants and build with those most affected. This is the only way to build a movement with more depth. Families that have survived the prison-industrial complex are not sob stories and charity cases; they are individuals that have survived one of the most sophisticated systems this society has for marginalizing someone. Their knowledge and determination makes our movement stronger. New organizations such as Deported Diaspora in Boston, new organizers such as Luisanna Santibanez in Austin, Texas, and older yet formidable organizations such as Homies Unidos in Los Angeles, and Families For Freedom in New York continue to dedicate their time to building in the most impacted communities. More efforts like this have to be incubated and supported.
4) We must build the capacity of grassroots organizations to create the solutions to their own problems. Policies in the beltway must be grounded in the wisdom and intellect of communities on the ground. But that can only happen when immigrant communities develop the faith and the capacity to create those solutions. Otherwise, solutions in the beltway will be made for immigrants, not by immigrants.
5) We must identify the ideas and institutions in immigrant communities that we need to protect, and protect them vigorously. The things that enable a detainee to represent himself and win his freedom, or enable an immigrant family to survive the desert and support family on two continents are the same things that will enable us to build real alternatives to the world we live in today. When we forsake what our communities have already built, we forsake our real power.
6) We must confront the Department of Homeland Security more directly. From Hurricane Katrina, to the ICE raids, to corrupt agents along the border, the Department of Homeland Security has survived numerous investigations and audits only see its budget increase even more. If we don’t find more creative and strategic ways to confront ICE, we will see even more destruction of our communities and have no one else to blame.
Recently, I spoke with a family friend, a young Caribbean woman whose husband was detained by ICE. Nearly everyone had told her that her husband would be deported. Despite this, through her persistence, he was released a month after being detained. On the way home from picking him up she told me “I said my prayers and knew if I fought hard enough, I would see us together again.” With that spirit, I know that if we fight smart and fight hard, our communities, our families, and our loved ones will win this fight.
Author: Subhash Kateel, 08 Oct. 2009, Source: LeftTurn
In California, Uncertainty on Immigrant Student Tuition
By Elizabeth Redden
Inside Higher Education
September 17, 2008
In reinstating a lawsuit challenging tuition policy Monday, a California appeals court unanimously found that a state statute extending lower in-state tuition rates to illegal immigrants conflicts with federal law and “thwarts the will of Congress.”
California is one of 10 states that makes undocumented students eligible for in-state tuition rates. In California’s case, students can be exempt from paying nonresident rates if they graduated from and attended a California high school for three or more years and, in the case of undocumented students, if they file an affidavit stating intent to legalize their status if they become eligible to do so.
On a federal level, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit dismissed a challenge to a similar law in Kansas in 2007 because the plaintiffs were found to lack standing.
In the appeal court’s ruling in Martinez v. Regents of the University of California, which had earlier been dismissed by a trial court, the panel of three judges defined the central question at hand as whether the state’s authorization of in-state tuition rates for illegal immigrants violates federal law, which maintains: “Notwithstanding any other provision of law, an alien who is not lawfully present in the United States shall not be eligible on the basis of residence within a state (or a political subdivision) for any postsecondary education benefit unless a citizen or national of the United States is eligible for such a benefit (in no less an amount, duration, and scope) without regard to whether the citizen or national is such a resident.”
The defendants — spanning all three of California’s public university and college systems — held that the state statute does not conflict with federal law because (1) in-state tuition is not a “benefit,” as it’s defined under federal law, and because (2) rather than being extended “on the basis of residence within a state,” lower tuition rates for illegal immigrants are conditioned on California high school attendance and graduation.
The appellate court rejected the colleges’ arguments on both counts, finding, on the first point, that significantly cheaper in-state tuition is in fact a “benefit.” Furthermore, the judges write, “the three-year attendance requirement at a California high school is a surrogate residence requirement.”
The section of California’s education code at issue here “falls within the principle of implied preemption in that it stands as an obstacle to the accomplishment and execution of the full purposes and objectives of Congress,” the appeals court found. The judges returned the case for consideration at the lower trial court level.
“I think it’s going to be very difficult for the defendants to defend this policy, in that the higher court, the appellate court, has already decided that ...this one section of the education code is preempted by federal law,” said Ralph W. Kasarda, a staff attorney for the Sacramento-based Pacific Legal Foundation, which filed a brief in support of the plaintiffs.
Filed as a class action suit, the plaintiffs are a group of U.S. citizen students (or tuition-paying parents). The students are from other states but are enrolled at California public colleges at nonresident tuition rates. They argue that the high school attendance requirement “illegally discriminates” against them “by denying them a benefit provided to illegal aliens.”
“The State of California here tried to claim that they carefully chose their words in the statute in such a way to evade Congress’ intent and find a loophole in the statute. And what the court said was, ‘No, no such loophole exists,’ ” said Kris W. Kobach, a professor of law at University of Missouri at Kansas City who is one of two lead lawyers for the plaintiffs.
While the California appeals court decision is not binding in other states, it will likely have an impact beyond the state’s borders, Kobach said. “Frequently you will hear of states considering nearly identical statutes as the California law, and one of the arguments that is made is, ‘California’s law has never been struck down. None of these other laws have been struck down or held to be in violation of federal law, why don’t we go ahead and do it?’ Now every state legislature in the country will be put on notice.”
“It should serve as a shot across the bow to the other nine states that they are potentially exposed to liability because of their statutes,” Kobach continued.
Christopher M. Patti, university counsel for the UC System, said that while lawyers are still analyzing the opinion, “We are considering the possibility of a petition for review in the California Supreme Court.”
“I think that in any appeal the major focus would likely be on this issue of whether this is a residency-based requirement,” said Patti. “The legislature thought about that issue and tried to fashion a bill that complied with federal law, and we think they did that successfully. So that’s something that if there’s an appeal, the Supreme Court is going to have to grapple with.”
As of now, however, “the law is still in full effect, and [the decision] should not have any immediate impact on the colleges,” said Steven Bruckman, executive vice chancellor and general counsel for the California Community College System. He estimated that about 20,000 community college students, most of whom are undocumented immigrants, would lose their eligibility for cheaper resident tuition if the law were ultimately declared invalid.
“Our mission is to provide broad access to education. A court ruling that would limit access to students is disappointing to us,” he said.
“We will fight it as long as it is necessary to clarify this,” said Michael A. Olivas, a professor and expert on higher education and immigration law at the University of Houston. He faulted the California appeals court for misreading laws relative to residency. “What federal law requires is that people who have access to this status of being a resident may not be given any more advantage if they’re undocumented than if they’re a citizen. I say that’s fine. California still requires that you have been there 12 months [to declare residency]. The undocumented don’t get it by 11 months.”
Olivas disagreed with the assertion that the decision is relevant in other states, although he acknowledges it is being watched widely. “No other state is bound by what one state does, and they’re particularly not bound by it when the state got it wrong. They weren’t bound by it when the trial court in effect got it right.”
Inside Higher Education
September 17, 2008
In reinstating a lawsuit challenging tuition policy Monday, a California appeals court unanimously found that a state statute extending lower in-state tuition rates to illegal immigrants conflicts with federal law and “thwarts the will of Congress.”
California is one of 10 states that makes undocumented students eligible for in-state tuition rates. In California’s case, students can be exempt from paying nonresident rates if they graduated from and attended a California high school for three or more years and, in the case of undocumented students, if they file an affidavit stating intent to legalize their status if they become eligible to do so.
On a federal level, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit dismissed a challenge to a similar law in Kansas in 2007 because the plaintiffs were found to lack standing.
In the appeal court’s ruling in Martinez v. Regents of the University of California, which had earlier been dismissed by a trial court, the panel of three judges defined the central question at hand as whether the state’s authorization of in-state tuition rates for illegal immigrants violates federal law, which maintains: “Notwithstanding any other provision of law, an alien who is not lawfully present in the United States shall not be eligible on the basis of residence within a state (or a political subdivision) for any postsecondary education benefit unless a citizen or national of the United States is eligible for such a benefit (in no less an amount, duration, and scope) without regard to whether the citizen or national is such a resident.”
The defendants — spanning all three of California’s public university and college systems — held that the state statute does not conflict with federal law because (1) in-state tuition is not a “benefit,” as it’s defined under federal law, and because (2) rather than being extended “on the basis of residence within a state,” lower tuition rates for illegal immigrants are conditioned on California high school attendance and graduation.
The appellate court rejected the colleges’ arguments on both counts, finding, on the first point, that significantly cheaper in-state tuition is in fact a “benefit.” Furthermore, the judges write, “the three-year attendance requirement at a California high school is a surrogate residence requirement.”
The section of California’s education code at issue here “falls within the principle of implied preemption in that it stands as an obstacle to the accomplishment and execution of the full purposes and objectives of Congress,” the appeals court found. The judges returned the case for consideration at the lower trial court level.
“I think it’s going to be very difficult for the defendants to defend this policy, in that the higher court, the appellate court, has already decided that ...this one section of the education code is preempted by federal law,” said Ralph W. Kasarda, a staff attorney for the Sacramento-based Pacific Legal Foundation, which filed a brief in support of the plaintiffs.
Filed as a class action suit, the plaintiffs are a group of U.S. citizen students (or tuition-paying parents). The students are from other states but are enrolled at California public colleges at nonresident tuition rates. They argue that the high school attendance requirement “illegally discriminates” against them “by denying them a benefit provided to illegal aliens.”
“The State of California here tried to claim that they carefully chose their words in the statute in such a way to evade Congress’ intent and find a loophole in the statute. And what the court said was, ‘No, no such loophole exists,’ ” said Kris W. Kobach, a professor of law at University of Missouri at Kansas City who is one of two lead lawyers for the plaintiffs.
While the California appeals court decision is not binding in other states, it will likely have an impact beyond the state’s borders, Kobach said. “Frequently you will hear of states considering nearly identical statutes as the California law, and one of the arguments that is made is, ‘California’s law has never been struck down. None of these other laws have been struck down or held to be in violation of federal law, why don’t we go ahead and do it?’ Now every state legislature in the country will be put on notice.”
“It should serve as a shot across the bow to the other nine states that they are potentially exposed to liability because of their statutes,” Kobach continued.
Christopher M. Patti, university counsel for the UC System, said that while lawyers are still analyzing the opinion, “We are considering the possibility of a petition for review in the California Supreme Court.”
“I think that in any appeal the major focus would likely be on this issue of whether this is a residency-based requirement,” said Patti. “The legislature thought about that issue and tried to fashion a bill that complied with federal law, and we think they did that successfully. So that’s something that if there’s an appeal, the Supreme Court is going to have to grapple with.”
As of now, however, “the law is still in full effect, and [the decision] should not have any immediate impact on the colleges,” said Steven Bruckman, executive vice chancellor and general counsel for the California Community College System. He estimated that about 20,000 community college students, most of whom are undocumented immigrants, would lose their eligibility for cheaper resident tuition if the law were ultimately declared invalid.
“Our mission is to provide broad access to education. A court ruling that would limit access to students is disappointing to us,” he said.
“We will fight it as long as it is necessary to clarify this,” said Michael A. Olivas, a professor and expert on higher education and immigration law at the University of Houston. He faulted the California appeals court for misreading laws relative to residency. “What federal law requires is that people who have access to this status of being a resident may not be given any more advantage if they’re undocumented than if they’re a citizen. I say that’s fine. California still requires that you have been there 12 months [to declare residency]. The undocumented don’t get it by 11 months.”
Olivas disagreed with the assertion that the decision is relevant in other states, although he acknowledges it is being watched widely. “No other state is bound by what one state does, and they’re particularly not bound by it when the state got it wrong. They weren’t bound by it when the trial court in effect got it right.”
Friday, October 10, 2008
Students Are No Longer Surpassing Parents’ Educational Achievement
This is very upsetting. I've listed some of the key points at the end of the article.
You can also check out the full study"Generational Gains in Postsecondary Education Appear To Have Stalled" here.
-Patricia
by Robin Chen Delos | Diverse Issues in Higher Ed
Oct 9, 2008
The American tradition of generational upward mobility is at a standstill, and for some minority groups the younger generation is obtaining postsecondary education at lower levels than older adults, according to a new report released Thursday by the American Council on Education (ACE).
The overall percentage of young adults in their 20s and older adults over 30 with at least an associate degree was almost the same. But lower numbers of Hispanics and Native Americans were earning higher education degrees than their elders. For Hispanics, 18 percent of the older generation held at least an associate degree as compared with only 16 percent of young Hispanics, according to the Minorities in Higher Education 2008 Twenty-third Annual Status Report.
“It appears we are at a tipping point in our nation’s history,” says ACE President Molly Corbett Broad. “One of the core tenants of the American dream is the hope that younger generations, who’ve had greater opportunities for education advancement than their parents and grandparents, will be better off than the generations before them, yet this report shows that aspiration is at serious risk.”
Postsecondary achievement rates for Blacks remained the same between the younger and older generations, at about 24 percent. The two groups whose young people made gains over their elders were Asian Americans and Whites. Sixty-six percent of young Asian Americans holding at least an associate degree while 54 percent of the older generation had achieved the same level.
The generational achievement gap is an issue the presidential candidates should tackle, says Dr. Dolores Fernandez, president of predominantly Hispanic-serving City University of New York (CUNY)-Eugenio Maria de Hostos Community College.
Though the economy was the main issue in this week’s presidential debate, “the fact that the younger generation is attaining less than the older generation is something that should really be ringing bells in this nation. Somebody needs to bring higher education and middle and high school education to the table, and it needs to be addressed in a very serious matter because we’re not paying attention to it like we should,” says Fernandez.
Report analysts found minority enrollment in colleges rose by 50 percent between 1995 and 2005. But despite record numbers of minorities attending college, progress was uneven and gaps widened. “This report demonstrates that educational progress, while significant, is not keeping pace with the changing demographic realities,” says Mikyung Ryu, assistant director in ACE’s Center for Policy Analysis and author of the report.
Gaps in higher education not only exist between different ethnic groups and generations, but also between men and women. Significantly lower numbers of males than females enroll in college. Across racial groups, 36 percent of young men enrolled in college as compared with 44 percent of their female peers. Some colleges are already actively working to encourage more males to enroll, specifically minorities. For instance, the CUNY system has an initiative to increase enrollment rates of minority men, according to Fernandez.
The report also looked at minorities working in higher education and found that though the numbers of minority faculty, administrators and presidents increased over the past decade, the vast majority of these positions are still filled by Whites.
More Key Findings from the Report:
*Total minority enrollment at the nation’s colleges and universities rose by 50 percent from 3.4 million students to 5 million students between 1995 and 2005. White enrollment increased from 9.9 million to 10.7 million, a gain of 8 percent.
*Students of color made up 29 percent of the nearly 17.5 million students on America’s campuses.
*Despite significant gains in college enrollment rates for young people from all races, progress was uneven and gaps widened. In 2006, 61 percent of Asian Americans aged 18 to 24 were enrolled in college compared with 44 percent of whites, 32 percent of African Americans, and 25 percent of Hispanics and American Indians respectively.
Additional Findings:
High School Completion
*The high school completion rate for African Americans aged 18 to 24 remained relatively flat over the past two decades at about 76 percent.
*Despite improving their rate of high school completion from 59 percent to 68 percent, Hispanics still had the lowest rate among all racial/ethnic groups.
*Asian Americans had the highest rate of high school completion at 91 percent.
College Enrollment
* College enrollment among African Americans rose by 46 percent between 1995 and 2005 to nearly 2 million students.
*The increase in Hispanic enrollment led all racial/ethnic groups, up by 66 percent to more than 1.7 million students. Hispanic enrollment grew faster at four-year institutions than at two-year institutions.
*Asian-American enrollment increased to more than 1 million over the 10-year period between 1995 and 2005, up 37 percent.
* American Indian enrollment grew by 31 percent in the 10-year period, up from nearly 127,000 in 1995 to nearly 167,000 in 2005.
* Regardless of race, the gender gap in the college enrollment rate continued among young people aged 18 to 24. Thirty-six percent of young men were enrolled in college in 2006 compared with 44 percent of young women.
College Persistence
*College persistence rates declined slightly, and these declines were more pronounced for students who began at two-year institutions, especially for Hispanics.
*Among students who began at two-year institutions in 1995 and 2003, 55 percent of the 2003 freshmen were still enrolled or had attained a certificate or degree anywhere in higher education three years later, compared with 60 percent for the 1995 cohort. For Hispanics, this rate dropped sharply from 62 percent to 54 percent.
*Among students who began at a four-year institution in 1995 and 2003, 81 percent of the 2003 cohort persisted, compared to 83 percent of the 1995 cohort.
Degrees Conferred
*Minorities outpaced whites in the percentage change in total degrees awarded at all levels over the past decade. Minority women showed stronger gains than minority men at all degree levels.
*The number of minorities earning associate degrees between 1995 and 2005 grew 84 percent to just over 201,000. The number of minorities earning bachelor’s degrees over the same period grew 65 percent to 355,000.
*Hispanics nearly doubled the number of bachelor’s degrees received over the last decade to more than 105,000. Hispanics also made dramatic gains in doctoral degrees earned, rising from 950 in 1995 to more than 1,700 in 2005, an increase of 83 percent.
*African Americans more than doubled the number of master’s degrees earned from nearly 25,000 in 1995 to nearly 53,000 in 2005. During the same period, the number of doctoral degrees earned by African Americans increased 84 percent from nearly 1,600 to nearly 2,900.
*During the past decade the number of Asian-American men receiving doctoral degrees dropped by 10 percent, while the number of Asian-American women receiving these degrees increased by 74 percent.
Degrees Conferred by Field
*In recent years, minorities and whites both experienced declines in the number of bachelor’s degrees earned in computer sciences. They also lost ground in engineering over the decade at the doctoral degree level.
Employment in Higher Education
*Although minorities have made gains as college faculty, administrators and presidents over the last decade, whites still fill the overwhelming majority of these positions.
*In 2005, minorities represented 17 percent of all college administrators; 16 percent of full-time faculty and 13 percent of college presidents.
You can also check out the full study"Generational Gains in Postsecondary Education Appear To Have Stalled" here.
-Patricia
by Robin Chen Delos | Diverse Issues in Higher Ed
Oct 9, 2008
The American tradition of generational upward mobility is at a standstill, and for some minority groups the younger generation is obtaining postsecondary education at lower levels than older adults, according to a new report released Thursday by the American Council on Education (ACE).
The overall percentage of young adults in their 20s and older adults over 30 with at least an associate degree was almost the same. But lower numbers of Hispanics and Native Americans were earning higher education degrees than their elders. For Hispanics, 18 percent of the older generation held at least an associate degree as compared with only 16 percent of young Hispanics, according to the Minorities in Higher Education 2008 Twenty-third Annual Status Report.
“It appears we are at a tipping point in our nation’s history,” says ACE President Molly Corbett Broad. “One of the core tenants of the American dream is the hope that younger generations, who’ve had greater opportunities for education advancement than their parents and grandparents, will be better off than the generations before them, yet this report shows that aspiration is at serious risk.”
Postsecondary achievement rates for Blacks remained the same between the younger and older generations, at about 24 percent. The two groups whose young people made gains over their elders were Asian Americans and Whites. Sixty-six percent of young Asian Americans holding at least an associate degree while 54 percent of the older generation had achieved the same level.
The generational achievement gap is an issue the presidential candidates should tackle, says Dr. Dolores Fernandez, president of predominantly Hispanic-serving City University of New York (CUNY)-Eugenio Maria de Hostos Community College.
Though the economy was the main issue in this week’s presidential debate, “the fact that the younger generation is attaining less than the older generation is something that should really be ringing bells in this nation. Somebody needs to bring higher education and middle and high school education to the table, and it needs to be addressed in a very serious matter because we’re not paying attention to it like we should,” says Fernandez.
Report analysts found minority enrollment in colleges rose by 50 percent between 1995 and 2005. But despite record numbers of minorities attending college, progress was uneven and gaps widened. “This report demonstrates that educational progress, while significant, is not keeping pace with the changing demographic realities,” says Mikyung Ryu, assistant director in ACE’s Center for Policy Analysis and author of the report.
Gaps in higher education not only exist between different ethnic groups and generations, but also between men and women. Significantly lower numbers of males than females enroll in college. Across racial groups, 36 percent of young men enrolled in college as compared with 44 percent of their female peers. Some colleges are already actively working to encourage more males to enroll, specifically minorities. For instance, the CUNY system has an initiative to increase enrollment rates of minority men, according to Fernandez.
The report also looked at minorities working in higher education and found that though the numbers of minority faculty, administrators and presidents increased over the past decade, the vast majority of these positions are still filled by Whites.
More Key Findings from the Report:
*Total minority enrollment at the nation’s colleges and universities rose by 50 percent from 3.4 million students to 5 million students between 1995 and 2005. White enrollment increased from 9.9 million to 10.7 million, a gain of 8 percent.
*Students of color made up 29 percent of the nearly 17.5 million students on America’s campuses.
*Despite significant gains in college enrollment rates for young people from all races, progress was uneven and gaps widened. In 2006, 61 percent of Asian Americans aged 18 to 24 were enrolled in college compared with 44 percent of whites, 32 percent of African Americans, and 25 percent of Hispanics and American Indians respectively.
Additional Findings:
High School Completion
*The high school completion rate for African Americans aged 18 to 24 remained relatively flat over the past two decades at about 76 percent.
*Despite improving their rate of high school completion from 59 percent to 68 percent, Hispanics still had the lowest rate among all racial/ethnic groups.
*Asian Americans had the highest rate of high school completion at 91 percent.
College Enrollment
* College enrollment among African Americans rose by 46 percent between 1995 and 2005 to nearly 2 million students.
*The increase in Hispanic enrollment led all racial/ethnic groups, up by 66 percent to more than 1.7 million students. Hispanic enrollment grew faster at four-year institutions than at two-year institutions.
*Asian-American enrollment increased to more than 1 million over the 10-year period between 1995 and 2005, up 37 percent.
* American Indian enrollment grew by 31 percent in the 10-year period, up from nearly 127,000 in 1995 to nearly 167,000 in 2005.
* Regardless of race, the gender gap in the college enrollment rate continued among young people aged 18 to 24. Thirty-six percent of young men were enrolled in college in 2006 compared with 44 percent of young women.
College Persistence
*College persistence rates declined slightly, and these declines were more pronounced for students who began at two-year institutions, especially for Hispanics.
*Among students who began at two-year institutions in 1995 and 2003, 55 percent of the 2003 freshmen were still enrolled or had attained a certificate or degree anywhere in higher education three years later, compared with 60 percent for the 1995 cohort. For Hispanics, this rate dropped sharply from 62 percent to 54 percent.
*Among students who began at a four-year institution in 1995 and 2003, 81 percent of the 2003 cohort persisted, compared to 83 percent of the 1995 cohort.
Degrees Conferred
*Minorities outpaced whites in the percentage change in total degrees awarded at all levels over the past decade. Minority women showed stronger gains than minority men at all degree levels.
*The number of minorities earning associate degrees between 1995 and 2005 grew 84 percent to just over 201,000. The number of minorities earning bachelor’s degrees over the same period grew 65 percent to 355,000.
*Hispanics nearly doubled the number of bachelor’s degrees received over the last decade to more than 105,000. Hispanics also made dramatic gains in doctoral degrees earned, rising from 950 in 1995 to more than 1,700 in 2005, an increase of 83 percent.
*African Americans more than doubled the number of master’s degrees earned from nearly 25,000 in 1995 to nearly 53,000 in 2005. During the same period, the number of doctoral degrees earned by African Americans increased 84 percent from nearly 1,600 to nearly 2,900.
*During the past decade the number of Asian-American men receiving doctoral degrees dropped by 10 percent, while the number of Asian-American women receiving these degrees increased by 74 percent.
Degrees Conferred by Field
*In recent years, minorities and whites both experienced declines in the number of bachelor’s degrees earned in computer sciences. They also lost ground in engineering over the decade at the doctoral degree level.
Employment in Higher Education
*Although minorities have made gains as college faculty, administrators and presidents over the last decade, whites still fill the overwhelming majority of these positions.
*In 2005, minorities represented 17 percent of all college administrators; 16 percent of full-time faculty and 13 percent of college presidents.
Texas requires legal status for IDs, licenses
The Associated Press
Oct. 8, 2008
AUSTIN — People who aren't U.S. citizens must now prove they are living legally in the country before receiving or renewing a Texas driver's license or identification card.
Under the new administrative rule, the Department of Public Safety will require immigration documents that prove a person's lawful status.
After verifying an immigration document, DPS will include the designation "Temporary Visitor" and the date the person's status expires on the card, the governor's office said in a statement Wednesday. The face of the card also will look different, making it easily distinguishable.
To receive a duplicate or renewal identification or driver's license, the person must show the immigration status has been extended or updated, DPS said.
U.S. citizens do not have to provide documentation, the agency said.
DPS will not issue identification or driver's licenses to applicants who have permission to be in the U.S. for less than six months. Those who are not legally in the country or who overstayed without permission cannot get a driver's license or identification card.
Gov. Rick Perry praised the new rule, which took effect this month. The rule was adopted in August, DPS said.
The Public Safety Commission asked for the guideline, saying it was necessary to verify residency in the state, enhance security and deter fraud and misrepresentation.
The change brings Texas closer to complying with the federal REAL ID Act, said DPS spokesman Tom Vinger. The act requires states to issue drivers licenses to U.S. citizens or legal immigrants or create specially marked licenses if they are issued to people who cannot prove they are in the country legally.
Oct. 8, 2008
AUSTIN — People who aren't U.S. citizens must now prove they are living legally in the country before receiving or renewing a Texas driver's license or identification card.
Under the new administrative rule, the Department of Public Safety will require immigration documents that prove a person's lawful status.
After verifying an immigration document, DPS will include the designation "Temporary Visitor" and the date the person's status expires on the card, the governor's office said in a statement Wednesday. The face of the card also will look different, making it easily distinguishable.
To receive a duplicate or renewal identification or driver's license, the person must show the immigration status has been extended or updated, DPS said.
U.S. citizens do not have to provide documentation, the agency said.
DPS will not issue identification or driver's licenses to applicants who have permission to be in the U.S. for less than six months. Those who are not legally in the country or who overstayed without permission cannot get a driver's license or identification card.
Gov. Rick Perry praised the new rule, which took effect this month. The rule was adopted in August, DPS said.
The Public Safety Commission asked for the guideline, saying it was necessary to verify residency in the state, enhance security and deter fraud and misrepresentation.
The change brings Texas closer to complying with the federal REAL ID Act, said DPS spokesman Tom Vinger. The act requires states to issue drivers licenses to U.S. citizens or legal immigrants or create specially marked licenses if they are issued to people who cannot prove they are in the country legally.
Community torn apart by SC immigration raid
By MITCH WEISS and JEFFREY COLLINS | Associated Press
October 8, 2008
GREENVILLE, S.C. (AP) — When Magdalana Domingo Ramirez Lopez moved to this South Carolina city nearly two years ago to work at the chicken processing plant, she felt at home.
On weekends, the neighborhood near House of Raeford's plant was filled with the sounds of salsa music and the scents of Guatemalan cooking. She would shop with her three small sons at nearby businesses that catered to the immigrants — some in the country legally, others not.
While the sights and sounds reminded Lopez of her native Guatemala, she said she was happy living in the United States — a place that offered a better life for her and her three young sons.
But those hopes were shattered Tuesday when federal agents swooped into the plant, arresting 330 suspected illegal immigrants, six of them juveniles, effectively shutting down the factory and tearing apart the close-knit community.
Lopez was arrested and could be deported, as her husband was two years ago.
"My whole life has changed," she said as tears rolled down her cheeks. "I don't want to go back. My sons are better off here. The country is so poor. There's nothing there."
A day after the raid, families waited to hear from loved ones at detention centers. Meanwhile, businesses and streets were vacant because those not rounded up stayed home, afraid agents would return.
Just days before, poultry workers visibly filled the neighborhoods around the plant.
The community's transformation was slow but steady over the last 15 years as the newcomers replaced working-class whites and blacks. Neighborhood residents who knew about federal charges against plant supervisors accused of helping illegal immigrants forge documents didn't think the trouble would trickle down to them.
After all, they were only here to give the plant long hours of joint-aching work and local officials didn't seem to mind. That thought was likely shared by immigrants in communities nationwide including states throughout the South, Iowa and New York who have been caught in similar raids by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Lopez, 29, believed she was safe. But she spent most of Tuesday being fingerprinted and questioned by federal agents and a day later was coming to grips with being sent back to Guatemala. Her sons — ages 4, 5 and 6 — were all born in the U.S.
"The whole time I was there with police, I cried. I kept thinking about my sons. That I wouldn't see them again," she said.
She left Central America because she didn't want her family to grow up in a place where she was so hungry at times that she had to eat grass and dirt.
"I came to the U.S. for work. I came in peace. My goal was to help my sons grow up in a better place. Now that's gone," she said.
House of Raeford processes chickens and turkeys in eight plants in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Louisiana and Michigan. The Greenville plant and its nearly 900 workers have been under scrutiny for almost a year as authorities looked into allegations the company knowingly hired illegal immigrants. Eleven supervisors and the plant's human resources director have been arrested, mostly for falsifying immigration documents.
The company has issued a statement saying it never knowingly hired illegal immigrants and was cooperating.
Many workers say they had no idea about the legal troubles or that a raid was imminent.
"We never thought they would come in and start arresting everyone," said 35-year-old Jorge Mendoza, who missed the morning raid because he works second shift. "That would be like shutting down the plant. They wouldn't do that, we thought. The plant is too busy."
Mendoza said he plans to move his family because it's too dangerous to stay.
Greenville County deputies couldn't do much about illegal immigrants because no provision in South Carolina law makes it illegal to be in the U.S. without permission. Instead, deputies who thought they arrested or spoke to an illegal immigrant were told to contact federal immigration officials, said Master Deputy Michael Hildebrand.
Those arrested in the raid face various charges, including re-entry after deportation, counterfeit documents and false statements. All are in the U.S. Marshal's custody and have been processed for deportation.
Luis Garcia, an interpreter in the area, said removing so many people will devastate the community.
"They're breaking families. Everyone is worried," said Garcia, who visited Lopez to see how she was doing.
Lopez is under house arrest and has to wear an ankle monitor until her deportation hearing Nov. 14. She has no money to hire a lawyer.
Her 4-year-old son, Issias, is recovering from surgery she doubted he would get proper medical care in Guatemala, where she plans to take her children to rejoin their father.
When immigration officials asked her to sign a deportation order, she said she refused, replying: "First you kill me, then I'll sign it."
Several miles down the road, Emilio Espinoza manages the Guatemala Restaurant in a strip mall with a grocery store, bakery and nightclub, all catering toward Hispanics.
His usually packed restaurant was empty at lunchtime Wednesday for the first time since he opened seven years ago. Half his employees didn't show up because they were scared immigration agents might be in the area.
"People are afraid to leave their homes," said the 35-year-old Espinoza.
David Wynn said he has watched the neighborhood change around his heating and air conditioning supply store across the street from the plant.
Everyone knew the plant hired illegal immigrants, said Wynn, who added no one wanted to do anything about it because they figured the workers were doing jobs no one else wanted. With the economy getting worse, that's probably no longer true and he worries what is going to happen to all the people caught up in the raid.
"We need to pray for them," Wynn said.
October 8, 2008
GREENVILLE, S.C. (AP) — When Magdalana Domingo Ramirez Lopez moved to this South Carolina city nearly two years ago to work at the chicken processing plant, she felt at home.
On weekends, the neighborhood near House of Raeford's plant was filled with the sounds of salsa music and the scents of Guatemalan cooking. She would shop with her three small sons at nearby businesses that catered to the immigrants — some in the country legally, others not.
While the sights and sounds reminded Lopez of her native Guatemala, she said she was happy living in the United States — a place that offered a better life for her and her three young sons.
But those hopes were shattered Tuesday when federal agents swooped into the plant, arresting 330 suspected illegal immigrants, six of them juveniles, effectively shutting down the factory and tearing apart the close-knit community.
Lopez was arrested and could be deported, as her husband was two years ago.
"My whole life has changed," she said as tears rolled down her cheeks. "I don't want to go back. My sons are better off here. The country is so poor. There's nothing there."
A day after the raid, families waited to hear from loved ones at detention centers. Meanwhile, businesses and streets were vacant because those not rounded up stayed home, afraid agents would return.
Just days before, poultry workers visibly filled the neighborhoods around the plant.
The community's transformation was slow but steady over the last 15 years as the newcomers replaced working-class whites and blacks. Neighborhood residents who knew about federal charges against plant supervisors accused of helping illegal immigrants forge documents didn't think the trouble would trickle down to them.
After all, they were only here to give the plant long hours of joint-aching work and local officials didn't seem to mind. That thought was likely shared by immigrants in communities nationwide including states throughout the South, Iowa and New York who have been caught in similar raids by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Lopez, 29, believed she was safe. But she spent most of Tuesday being fingerprinted and questioned by federal agents and a day later was coming to grips with being sent back to Guatemala. Her sons — ages 4, 5 and 6 — were all born in the U.S.
"The whole time I was there with police, I cried. I kept thinking about my sons. That I wouldn't see them again," she said.
She left Central America because she didn't want her family to grow up in a place where she was so hungry at times that she had to eat grass and dirt.
"I came to the U.S. for work. I came in peace. My goal was to help my sons grow up in a better place. Now that's gone," she said.
House of Raeford processes chickens and turkeys in eight plants in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Louisiana and Michigan. The Greenville plant and its nearly 900 workers have been under scrutiny for almost a year as authorities looked into allegations the company knowingly hired illegal immigrants. Eleven supervisors and the plant's human resources director have been arrested, mostly for falsifying immigration documents.
The company has issued a statement saying it never knowingly hired illegal immigrants and was cooperating.
Many workers say they had no idea about the legal troubles or that a raid was imminent.
"We never thought they would come in and start arresting everyone," said 35-year-old Jorge Mendoza, who missed the morning raid because he works second shift. "That would be like shutting down the plant. They wouldn't do that, we thought. The plant is too busy."
Mendoza said he plans to move his family because it's too dangerous to stay.
Greenville County deputies couldn't do much about illegal immigrants because no provision in South Carolina law makes it illegal to be in the U.S. without permission. Instead, deputies who thought they arrested or spoke to an illegal immigrant were told to contact federal immigration officials, said Master Deputy Michael Hildebrand.
Those arrested in the raid face various charges, including re-entry after deportation, counterfeit documents and false statements. All are in the U.S. Marshal's custody and have been processed for deportation.
Luis Garcia, an interpreter in the area, said removing so many people will devastate the community.
"They're breaking families. Everyone is worried," said Garcia, who visited Lopez to see how she was doing.
Lopez is under house arrest and has to wear an ankle monitor until her deportation hearing Nov. 14. She has no money to hire a lawyer.
Her 4-year-old son, Issias, is recovering from surgery she doubted he would get proper medical care in Guatemala, where she plans to take her children to rejoin their father.
When immigration officials asked her to sign a deportation order, she said she refused, replying: "First you kill me, then I'll sign it."
Several miles down the road, Emilio Espinoza manages the Guatemala Restaurant in a strip mall with a grocery store, bakery and nightclub, all catering toward Hispanics.
His usually packed restaurant was empty at lunchtime Wednesday for the first time since he opened seven years ago. Half his employees didn't show up because they were scared immigration agents might be in the area.
"People are afraid to leave their homes," said the 35-year-old Espinoza.
David Wynn said he has watched the neighborhood change around his heating and air conditioning supply store across the street from the plant.
Everyone knew the plant hired illegal immigrants, said Wynn, who added no one wanted to do anything about it because they figured the workers were doing jobs no one else wanted. With the economy getting worse, that's probably no longer true and he worries what is going to happen to all the people caught up in the raid.
"We need to pray for them," Wynn said.
Wednesday, October 08, 2008
Change for the better?
Austin school district spending $1.37 million to reform middle schools.
By Laura Heinauer
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Monday, October 06, 2008
She paces, she shouts, she teases them, and she calls them out.
"Gentlemen, the day I wear a jumper and a little apple pin is the day you're back in the fifth grade and you can whine," Dobie Middle School teacher Holly Van Eis, dressed in a no-frills shirt and slacks, said to a classroom full of sixth-grade boys.
Getting the students engaged in the day's lesson — on differences between literal, inferential and thematic styles of writing — took a little strong arming, literally: "Seriously, do you want to arm wrestle?" she asked to one boy, a challenge that seemed to turn every head in the room. "You lose and you lose all bathroom passes for a week."
Dobie's experiment in all-boys and all-girls classrooms is one of the initiatives the Austin school district implemented this year as part of a middle school reform effort, a follow-up to the high school reforms that began in 2005 and brought smaller, career focused "school-within-school" environments to campuses.
The effects of the high school reform efforts are difficult to gauge overall, but Johnston High School underwent two major redesigns before the state closed the school in June after five years of low performance. And Reagan High School, one of several to implement the small-school and enhanced student advisory First Things First model, has not met state goals for achievement test passing rates and dropout rates for the past three years and faces possible closure in 2009 if it doesn't improve.
Al Summers, director of professional development for the Ohio-based National Middle School Association, said the problem with many of these reforms is that there is not enough research on any of them to say which are best.
"The one thing you can say (about middle school students) is that kids this age are really unique, and you need teachers who understand that," he said.
The Austin middle school reforms would create more specialized environments for sixth- to eighth-grade students — including proposals for an all-boys school and a nontraditional school that could, for example, have flexible schedules; an increased focus on professional development for teachers; and the spread of several teaching and student advising techniques that have proved successful at various schools.
The district expects to spend $1.37 million on the plan this year, of which about half will spent on teacher development and recruitment, particularly at lower-performing schools.
Middle school, education experts say, is a crucial time for many students. Average student performance on the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills shows a marked drop when Austin students reach middle school: This year, 67 percent of fifth graders passed all tests compared with 59 percent of eighth-graders.
Paul Cruz, the district's associate superintendent of middle schools, said the middle school plan will focus on techniques that address the typical social and academic developments unique to early adolescence, such as tendencies to discourage parent and teacher involvement in their lives and struggles when it comes to controlling their behavior.
"Students at this stage of development learn differently, and we want to accept and take advantage of that," Cruz said. The district's 18 middle schools plan to continue a small schools approach that began several years ago by splitting students up into teams where groups of about 100 students within each grade share the same set of teachers to allow for better lesson planning and interdisciplinary collaboration, he said.
'Ways to connect'
Across the country, districts have increasingly identified middle school as a place where reforms may have a bigger impact on long-term student success. One of the biggest reform trends — a requirement that all eighth-graders take algebra with the idea that having a firm grasp of its abstract concepts is critical to succeeding in high school — is being tried this year in California but has received a negative reaction from some educators who worry that students might be forced into a class for which they aren't ready. Others have tried extending the school day, beefing up their exercise and nutrition curricula, and even eliminating middle school all together by creating schools that go from kindergarten through eighth grade or from sixth to 12th grade.
In addition to the money being spent on teacher development and recruitment, more than $350,000 will be spent on programs for struggling learners and improving lesson designs with a greater focus on technology.
Another $150,000 will pay for a program to help elementary students make the transition to middle school and for family resource centers on five campuses, programs that were started in recent years at Pearce and Webb middle schools.
The district also has brought in adolescent development experts to explain the latest research on cognitive and social development to help teachers better connect with their students, and another $100,000 will be spent on a curriculum aimed at character building and social development.
"You deal with a lot of volatility and a lot of change," said Russell Lyday, a Small Middle School counselor who served on a task force made up of educators and community members that helped craft the middle school plan. "The trick is finding ways to connect with these kids and channel that energy into the things that are ultimately going to make them successful."
Taking a lead role
Dobie was rated an academically acceptable campus in 2007 and 2008 under the state school accountability system after one year of performing below state standards. The school is now sharing with other district middle schools techniques that work.
The campus was the first to hold Student Data Conferences, now a requirement for all middle schools in the district. In the conferences, teachers meet with students and students and their parents at least once every six weeks to address challenges and to review benchmarks and test scores to track progress.
"We're like a physician," Van Eis said. "We do all the necessary diagnostics and blood work exams, so it's not just the parents, but the students who know what they need to work on."
The campus is also playing a lead role in the district with new teaching and learning techniques — such as with single-sex classrooms, something that has already been tried at the Ann Richards School for Young Women Leaders, the only middle school in the district to earn an exemplary rating this year.
Beginning this year, Dobie administrators put the majority of sixth-graders into all-boys and all-girls math and English classes, leaving some in traditional mixed settings as a comparison group to assess any differences in performance.
Van Eis approaches the boys and girls classes very differently: With the boys, she moves around a lot more, speaks loudly and makes a conscious effort to lighten things up.
"Boys don't hear as acutely, so I really try to project my voice. And they need more silliness, so I'll shake things up to keep them focused," Van Eis said. "With girls, when you re-direct them, it's 'Sweetie, I really need you to do this because ... .' With boys, you can be much more direct and blunt. There's usually no need for the explanation.
"Also with boys, you can call them out when they are messing up," she said. "But with girls, you do that, and they'll hold a grudge for six months."
Sixth-grader Robert Sanchez said he likes the change: "It's better because you can concentrate more."
Another program, Advancement Via Individual Determination, devotes one period in the school day for tutoring and college searches.
Dobie Middle School teacher Christy Jones Barrett said the program provides students with test and note-taking strategies, builds leadership with community service activities, brings college students in to tutor middle schoolers, and helps direct middle school students through the college search and financial aid process.
"These are students, who if they don't get started now, may not ever get the chance to go to college," Barrett said.
By Laura Heinauer
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Monday, October 06, 2008
She paces, she shouts, she teases them, and she calls them out.
"Gentlemen, the day I wear a jumper and a little apple pin is the day you're back in the fifth grade and you can whine," Dobie Middle School teacher Holly Van Eis, dressed in a no-frills shirt and slacks, said to a classroom full of sixth-grade boys.
Getting the students engaged in the day's lesson — on differences between literal, inferential and thematic styles of writing — took a little strong arming, literally: "Seriously, do you want to arm wrestle?" she asked to one boy, a challenge that seemed to turn every head in the room. "You lose and you lose all bathroom passes for a week."
Dobie's experiment in all-boys and all-girls classrooms is one of the initiatives the Austin school district implemented this year as part of a middle school reform effort, a follow-up to the high school reforms that began in 2005 and brought smaller, career focused "school-within-school" environments to campuses.
The effects of the high school reform efforts are difficult to gauge overall, but Johnston High School underwent two major redesigns before the state closed the school in June after five years of low performance. And Reagan High School, one of several to implement the small-school and enhanced student advisory First Things First model, has not met state goals for achievement test passing rates and dropout rates for the past three years and faces possible closure in 2009 if it doesn't improve.
Al Summers, director of professional development for the Ohio-based National Middle School Association, said the problem with many of these reforms is that there is not enough research on any of them to say which are best.
"The one thing you can say (about middle school students) is that kids this age are really unique, and you need teachers who understand that," he said.
The Austin middle school reforms would create more specialized environments for sixth- to eighth-grade students — including proposals for an all-boys school and a nontraditional school that could, for example, have flexible schedules; an increased focus on professional development for teachers; and the spread of several teaching and student advising techniques that have proved successful at various schools.
The district expects to spend $1.37 million on the plan this year, of which about half will spent on teacher development and recruitment, particularly at lower-performing schools.
Middle school, education experts say, is a crucial time for many students. Average student performance on the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills shows a marked drop when Austin students reach middle school: This year, 67 percent of fifth graders passed all tests compared with 59 percent of eighth-graders.
Paul Cruz, the district's associate superintendent of middle schools, said the middle school plan will focus on techniques that address the typical social and academic developments unique to early adolescence, such as tendencies to discourage parent and teacher involvement in their lives and struggles when it comes to controlling their behavior.
"Students at this stage of development learn differently, and we want to accept and take advantage of that," Cruz said. The district's 18 middle schools plan to continue a small schools approach that began several years ago by splitting students up into teams where groups of about 100 students within each grade share the same set of teachers to allow for better lesson planning and interdisciplinary collaboration, he said.
'Ways to connect'
Across the country, districts have increasingly identified middle school as a place where reforms may have a bigger impact on long-term student success. One of the biggest reform trends — a requirement that all eighth-graders take algebra with the idea that having a firm grasp of its abstract concepts is critical to succeeding in high school — is being tried this year in California but has received a negative reaction from some educators who worry that students might be forced into a class for which they aren't ready. Others have tried extending the school day, beefing up their exercise and nutrition curricula, and even eliminating middle school all together by creating schools that go from kindergarten through eighth grade or from sixth to 12th grade.
In addition to the money being spent on teacher development and recruitment, more than $350,000 will be spent on programs for struggling learners and improving lesson designs with a greater focus on technology.
Another $150,000 will pay for a program to help elementary students make the transition to middle school and for family resource centers on five campuses, programs that were started in recent years at Pearce and Webb middle schools.
The district also has brought in adolescent development experts to explain the latest research on cognitive and social development to help teachers better connect with their students, and another $100,000 will be spent on a curriculum aimed at character building and social development.
"You deal with a lot of volatility and a lot of change," said Russell Lyday, a Small Middle School counselor who served on a task force made up of educators and community members that helped craft the middle school plan. "The trick is finding ways to connect with these kids and channel that energy into the things that are ultimately going to make them successful."
Taking a lead role
Dobie was rated an academically acceptable campus in 2007 and 2008 under the state school accountability system after one year of performing below state standards. The school is now sharing with other district middle schools techniques that work.
The campus was the first to hold Student Data Conferences, now a requirement for all middle schools in the district. In the conferences, teachers meet with students and students and their parents at least once every six weeks to address challenges and to review benchmarks and test scores to track progress.
"We're like a physician," Van Eis said. "We do all the necessary diagnostics and blood work exams, so it's not just the parents, but the students who know what they need to work on."
The campus is also playing a lead role in the district with new teaching and learning techniques — such as with single-sex classrooms, something that has already been tried at the Ann Richards School for Young Women Leaders, the only middle school in the district to earn an exemplary rating this year.
Beginning this year, Dobie administrators put the majority of sixth-graders into all-boys and all-girls math and English classes, leaving some in traditional mixed settings as a comparison group to assess any differences in performance.
Van Eis approaches the boys and girls classes very differently: With the boys, she moves around a lot more, speaks loudly and makes a conscious effort to lighten things up.
"Boys don't hear as acutely, so I really try to project my voice. And they need more silliness, so I'll shake things up to keep them focused," Van Eis said. "With girls, when you re-direct them, it's 'Sweetie, I really need you to do this because ... .' With boys, you can be much more direct and blunt. There's usually no need for the explanation.
"Also with boys, you can call them out when they are messing up," she said. "But with girls, you do that, and they'll hold a grudge for six months."
Sixth-grader Robert Sanchez said he likes the change: "It's better because you can concentrate more."
Another program, Advancement Via Individual Determination, devotes one period in the school day for tutoring and college searches.
Dobie Middle School teacher Christy Jones Barrett said the program provides students with test and note-taking strategies, builds leadership with community service activities, brings college students in to tutor middle schoolers, and helps direct middle school students through the college search and financial aid process.
"These are students, who if they don't get started now, may not ever get the chance to go to college," Barrett said.
An Education Agenda for Latino Students
An Education Agenda for Latino Students
By Melissa Lazarín | September 15, 2008
The strength of our nation’s schools and America’s place in the global economy will be impossible to evaluate in the coming years without focusing on the educational outcomes of Latino students. One in five—approximately 10 million—public school students are Latino. And the proportion of Hispanic school-aged children is expected to grow by 166 percent by 2050, quickly outpacing the 4 percent expected growth of non-Hispanic children. Yet Latinos are among the least likely to enter kindergarten ready to learn and least likely to graduate from high school.
Federal policymakers have a lot of work to do in improving education for Latinos. Here are eight ideas they can start with:
1. Make accountability work for English language learners
Nearly half—45 percent—of all Latino students are English language learners. The No Child Left Behind Act has not only helped to illuminate the large gaps between ELLs and their peers; it has compelled schools to implement strategies to reduce those gaps.
Yet holding schools accountable for the academic progress of ELLs has been met with some resistance due to the lack of valid academic assessments for this population. The 1994 Improving America’s Schools Act first required states to develop appropriate academic assessments for ELLs, but they are still sorely lacking nearly 15 years later.
Instead of potentially excluding half of the Latino student population from statewide accountability systems, the federal government should direct examinations into how to accelerate the development of these assessments. States need dollars and technical assistance to support these efforts, and their progress in developing these assessments needs to be better tracked and enforced.
2. Expand learning time
Lengthening the school day, week, or year can help students who are at risk of falling behind stay on track; expanded learning time gives students additional time to master academic content and provides teachers with an opportunity to better meet individual student needs. Additional time on task is invaluable in furthering English language learners’ and recently arrived immigrant students’ academic content and English proficiency skills. The recently introduced Time for Innovation Matters in Education Act, S. 3431, which provides federal support for state initiatives to expand learning time in high-poverty schools, will ensure that more Latinos benefit from this innovative school-wide reform.
3. Boost high school graduation rates
Only about half—58 percent—of Latinos graduate from high school. Schools will need to make measurable improvements in Latino college-readiness in the subjects of math, reading, and science, as well as increase the proportion of students who graduate with those core academic skills. A necessary first step will be to establish a common definition for calculating graduation rates and linking them to statewide accountability systems across race/ethnicity, language proficiency, income, and other characteristics.
4. Target resources and reforms to struggling high schools
Approximately 2,000 high schools—roughly 18 percent of all secondary schools—produce half of the nation’s dropouts. And 39 percent of all Latino students attend these schools. These statistics, while sobering, indicate that the dropout crisis is, in some ways, locatable, and that resources and reforms can be effectively targeted to the high schools that are struggling the most. The Graduation Promise Act, drafted with this framework in mind and introduced in both the House and Senate in 2007, would target dollars and supports to many of these struggling high schools that enroll a sizeable proportion of Latino students.
5. Pass the DREAM Act
Every year, 65,000 undocumented immigrant students who were brought to the United States as children graduate from high school. Many graduate at the top of their class, yet higher education remains an elusive opportunity. Due to their status, they lack access to loans, federal grants, most private scholarships, and they typically have to pay out-of-state tuition rates regardless of how long they have resided in a state.
A large number of undocumented immigrant students drop out of high school due to the lack of opportunities after high school, exacerbating an already significant dropout crisis. Contrary to common public opinion, these young people have few, if any, opportunities to legalize their status. If passed, the DREAM Act would remove some of the barriers to higher education for these individuals and provide a path to citizenship if they graduate from high school and pursue at least two years of higher education or military service.
6. Ensure that federal Title I dollars are distributed efficiently and fairly
Federal Title I dollars make up a small proportion of K-12 funding, but many poor districts and schools rely heavily on this additional support, and distribution of such dollars must be both fair and efficient. Unfortunately, the Title I formula does not treat states equitably. For example, the federal government sent two states with similar tax efforts, but very different per pupil investments—Massachusetts and California—$2,310 and $1,280 respectively for each Title I eligible student in the 2003-04 school year.
Title I formula grants distributed based on state tax effort and the numbers of low-income students would better ensure that federal dollars are distributed where they are needed the most. So, too, would continued increases in the funding for the Education Finance Incentive Grants, which reward states that equitably allocate state and local dollars, and are the most highly targeted of all the federal funding formulas under Title I.
7. Increase the supply of highly effective teachers
Research by Education Trust shows that Latino, black, and poor students in Texas are “less likely to be assigned to teachers who know their subject matter, less likely to be in classrooms with experienced teachers and less likely to attend schools with a stable teaching force.” Other researchers across the country have also documented this pattern. The reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act is an opportunity to rethink the way teachers are compensated. Those who are willing to teach in struggling schools and deliver positive results, for example, should get paid more.
8. Invest in early childhood care and education
The positive and lasting benefits of early care and education are well documented. Yet only 49 percent of Latino children—compared to 60 to 62 percent of white, African American, Asia, and American Indian children—are enrolled in center-based early childhood care and education programs, which include day care centers, Head Start, preschool/prekindergarten, and nursery school. Greater federal investment in early care and education programs can help increase access for all children from birth to age five, improve the quality of all early care and education programs, and ensure that existing federal preprimary programs, such as Head Start and Even Start, work effectively in coordination.
These policy changes are essential for Latinos’ academic success but would have broad benefits for all students. Some Asian-American students face similar language and immigrant-integration barriers, and African-American students suffer from many of the missed educational opportunities that Latinos experience.
Given our country’s changing demographics, the robustness of America’s public school system will increasingly depend on the academic performance of Latino students and other minorities. Seemingly lofty at first glance, the above policy recommendations have become necessary in the mission to strengthen American schools.
By Melissa Lazarín | September 15, 2008
The strength of our nation’s schools and America’s place in the global economy will be impossible to evaluate in the coming years without focusing on the educational outcomes of Latino students. One in five—approximately 10 million—public school students are Latino. And the proportion of Hispanic school-aged children is expected to grow by 166 percent by 2050, quickly outpacing the 4 percent expected growth of non-Hispanic children. Yet Latinos are among the least likely to enter kindergarten ready to learn and least likely to graduate from high school.
Federal policymakers have a lot of work to do in improving education for Latinos. Here are eight ideas they can start with:
1. Make accountability work for English language learners
Nearly half—45 percent—of all Latino students are English language learners. The No Child Left Behind Act has not only helped to illuminate the large gaps between ELLs and their peers; it has compelled schools to implement strategies to reduce those gaps.
Yet holding schools accountable for the academic progress of ELLs has been met with some resistance due to the lack of valid academic assessments for this population. The 1994 Improving America’s Schools Act first required states to develop appropriate academic assessments for ELLs, but they are still sorely lacking nearly 15 years later.
Instead of potentially excluding half of the Latino student population from statewide accountability systems, the federal government should direct examinations into how to accelerate the development of these assessments. States need dollars and technical assistance to support these efforts, and their progress in developing these assessments needs to be better tracked and enforced.
2. Expand learning time
Lengthening the school day, week, or year can help students who are at risk of falling behind stay on track; expanded learning time gives students additional time to master academic content and provides teachers with an opportunity to better meet individual student needs. Additional time on task is invaluable in furthering English language learners’ and recently arrived immigrant students’ academic content and English proficiency skills. The recently introduced Time for Innovation Matters in Education Act, S. 3431, which provides federal support for state initiatives to expand learning time in high-poverty schools, will ensure that more Latinos benefit from this innovative school-wide reform.
3. Boost high school graduation rates
Only about half—58 percent—of Latinos graduate from high school. Schools will need to make measurable improvements in Latino college-readiness in the subjects of math, reading, and science, as well as increase the proportion of students who graduate with those core academic skills. A necessary first step will be to establish a common definition for calculating graduation rates and linking them to statewide accountability systems across race/ethnicity, language proficiency, income, and other characteristics.
4. Target resources and reforms to struggling high schools
Approximately 2,000 high schools—roughly 18 percent of all secondary schools—produce half of the nation’s dropouts. And 39 percent of all Latino students attend these schools. These statistics, while sobering, indicate that the dropout crisis is, in some ways, locatable, and that resources and reforms can be effectively targeted to the high schools that are struggling the most. The Graduation Promise Act, drafted with this framework in mind and introduced in both the House and Senate in 2007, would target dollars and supports to many of these struggling high schools that enroll a sizeable proportion of Latino students.
5. Pass the DREAM Act
Every year, 65,000 undocumented immigrant students who were brought to the United States as children graduate from high school. Many graduate at the top of their class, yet higher education remains an elusive opportunity. Due to their status, they lack access to loans, federal grants, most private scholarships, and they typically have to pay out-of-state tuition rates regardless of how long they have resided in a state.
A large number of undocumented immigrant students drop out of high school due to the lack of opportunities after high school, exacerbating an already significant dropout crisis. Contrary to common public opinion, these young people have few, if any, opportunities to legalize their status. If passed, the DREAM Act would remove some of the barriers to higher education for these individuals and provide a path to citizenship if they graduate from high school and pursue at least two years of higher education or military service.
6. Ensure that federal Title I dollars are distributed efficiently and fairly
Federal Title I dollars make up a small proportion of K-12 funding, but many poor districts and schools rely heavily on this additional support, and distribution of such dollars must be both fair and efficient. Unfortunately, the Title I formula does not treat states equitably. For example, the federal government sent two states with similar tax efforts, but very different per pupil investments—Massachusetts and California—$2,310 and $1,280 respectively for each Title I eligible student in the 2003-04 school year.
Title I formula grants distributed based on state tax effort and the numbers of low-income students would better ensure that federal dollars are distributed where they are needed the most. So, too, would continued increases in the funding for the Education Finance Incentive Grants, which reward states that equitably allocate state and local dollars, and are the most highly targeted of all the federal funding formulas under Title I.
7. Increase the supply of highly effective teachers
Research by Education Trust shows that Latino, black, and poor students in Texas are “less likely to be assigned to teachers who know their subject matter, less likely to be in classrooms with experienced teachers and less likely to attend schools with a stable teaching force.” Other researchers across the country have also documented this pattern. The reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act is an opportunity to rethink the way teachers are compensated. Those who are willing to teach in struggling schools and deliver positive results, for example, should get paid more.
8. Invest in early childhood care and education
The positive and lasting benefits of early care and education are well documented. Yet only 49 percent of Latino children—compared to 60 to 62 percent of white, African American, Asia, and American Indian children—are enrolled in center-based early childhood care and education programs, which include day care centers, Head Start, preschool/prekindergarten, and nursery school. Greater federal investment in early care and education programs can help increase access for all children from birth to age five, improve the quality of all early care and education programs, and ensure that existing federal preprimary programs, such as Head Start and Even Start, work effectively in coordination.
These policy changes are essential for Latinos’ academic success but would have broad benefits for all students. Some Asian-American students face similar language and immigrant-integration barriers, and African-American students suffer from many of the missed educational opportunities that Latinos experience.
Given our country’s changing demographics, the robustness of America’s public school system will increasingly depend on the academic performance of Latino students and other minorities. Seemingly lofty at first glance, the above policy recommendations have become necessary in the mission to strengthen American schools.
How Should a College Begin to Think About Going Global?
Chronicle of Higher Ed
Commentary
September 15, 2008
Rapidly growing numbers of colleges and universities are interested in becoming more global, but there is no one model. The best approach varies from institution to institution. Each one must deal with certain basic issues, however, in order to move beyond rhetoric to a broad-based and sustained international effort. John K. Hudzik, vice president for global engagement and strategic projects at Michigan State University — which created the first office of international programs at a major American university, more than 50 years ago, and now has more than 1,200 professors and administrators involved in international scholarship, teaching, and service work — recommends that institutions, regardless of their size or mission, consider these key questions:
* What is the intended scope of the internationalization? Across the institutional mission, or only specific aspects? Whom is the effort intended to reach? Only some students and faculty members, or all of them? What about people outside the college?
* Is the vision for internationalization one that is mainly externally directed, like study abroad or development work abroad? Or is it intended to fundamentally reshape the living and learning environment on the home campus?
* Does the college have a vision, strategic plan, and accountability metrics to guide its intentions and actions? How much have faculty and staff members, students, and administrators bought into and contributed to the new international direction?
* How large and diverse an international student and faculty body does the college seek to have? What is the primary motivation to attract international students and faculty members? What role is envisioned for them with respect to internationalizing the campus environment, and how will they be integrated into the living and learning environment for that purpose?
* Will students and faculty members have access to language learning and cultural information through a variety of means, methods, and alternative pedagogies?
* How internationally experienced and engaged are the faculty members? Will future hiring practices, perhaps through all disciplines, seek those who meet such criteria? Is the college prepared to support and enhance faculty knowledge, skill, and experience in international areas?
* To what extent is the college willing to build strategic partnerships with institutions and groups abroad to support its internationalization of instruction, research, and outreach?
* What are the signature programs that might be seen as high-quality and valuable to partners abroad? Which of the college's programs would be significantly strengthened through systematic international engagement?
* Can the college expand its global reach through specific themes or areas of expertise in which it has a significant capacity to engage in international research, instruction, and community development and problem solving?
* Is the college prepared to become, and to see itself, not only as a local resource but also as a national and a global resource in some disciplines, programs, or areas of expertise?
http://chronicle.com
Section: Commentary
Volume 55, Issue 4, Page A34
Commentary
September 15, 2008
Rapidly growing numbers of colleges and universities are interested in becoming more global, but there is no one model. The best approach varies from institution to institution. Each one must deal with certain basic issues, however, in order to move beyond rhetoric to a broad-based and sustained international effort. John K. Hudzik, vice president for global engagement and strategic projects at Michigan State University — which created the first office of international programs at a major American university, more than 50 years ago, and now has more than 1,200 professors and administrators involved in international scholarship, teaching, and service work — recommends that institutions, regardless of their size or mission, consider these key questions:
* What is the intended scope of the internationalization? Across the institutional mission, or only specific aspects? Whom is the effort intended to reach? Only some students and faculty members, or all of them? What about people outside the college?
* Is the vision for internationalization one that is mainly externally directed, like study abroad or development work abroad? Or is it intended to fundamentally reshape the living and learning environment on the home campus?
* Does the college have a vision, strategic plan, and accountability metrics to guide its intentions and actions? How much have faculty and staff members, students, and administrators bought into and contributed to the new international direction?
* How large and diverse an international student and faculty body does the college seek to have? What is the primary motivation to attract international students and faculty members? What role is envisioned for them with respect to internationalizing the campus environment, and how will they be integrated into the living and learning environment for that purpose?
* Will students and faculty members have access to language learning and cultural information through a variety of means, methods, and alternative pedagogies?
* How internationally experienced and engaged are the faculty members? Will future hiring practices, perhaps through all disciplines, seek those who meet such criteria? Is the college prepared to support and enhance faculty knowledge, skill, and experience in international areas?
* To what extent is the college willing to build strategic partnerships with institutions and groups abroad to support its internationalization of instruction, research, and outreach?
* What are the signature programs that might be seen as high-quality and valuable to partners abroad? Which of the college's programs would be significantly strengthened through systematic international engagement?
* Can the college expand its global reach through specific themes or areas of expertise in which it has a significant capacity to engage in international research, instruction, and community development and problem solving?
* Is the college prepared to become, and to see itself, not only as a local resource but also as a national and a global resource in some disciplines, programs, or areas of expertise?
http://chronicle.com
Section: Commentary
Volume 55, Issue 4, Page A34
A Global Imperative
To check out the full report
Also, here's the Brief
-Patricia
A Progressive Approach to U.S.-China Relations in the 21st Century
By Nina Hachigian, Michael Schiffer
Winny Chen | August 13, 2008
Memo to the next president
The choices you make as the next president will have a defi ning infl uence on the contours of U.S.-China relations and, ultimately, China’s trajectory as a rising power. Realizing the potential of the U.S.-China relationship, while guarding against future uncertainties, will constitute a central challenge of your presidency and of American foreign policy this century. Because China’s future remains deeply uncertain, we can assume neither that the stability nor the prosperity that have generally characterized U.S.-China relations for the past several decades will continue, nor that confl ict is inevitable.
As president, you will have to manage the many national security problems bequeathed to you by your predecessor, especially in Iraq and Afghanistan, alongside a struggling global economy. But China’s rise across nearly every dimension of power is a central strategic fact of the 21st century, and your choices will shape the geopolitical environment for a long time to come. While the United States cannot determine what path China takes, your administration can help create the global context for China’s peaceful rise.
Getting China strategy right from the beginning of your administration will be critical to a successful U.S. policy on China. Presidents Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush all entered the White House in the wake of presidential campaigns replete with promises to be “tougher” on China—only to embrace a more pragmatic approach once the realities of the relationship became apparent. All three presidents lost valuable time and political capital.
Today, rapid changes to the global economy, the outsourcing and offshoring of U.S. jobs to China, and overall U.S. economic weakness combine to give unique momentum to the case that you, too, should take a “tougher” stance. To be sure, we have many serious policy differences with China—on human rights, currency exchange rates, and Sudan, to name a few. Yet the urgency of our shared challenges, most particularly on the need for dramatic reductions in global carbon emissions, but also on North Korea and other issues, requires a results-oriented strategy from the beginning.
Thus, you must reject the alarmism that frequently clouds policy debates on U.S.-China relations and take a clear-eyed, practical approach that does not see ruin or victory around every corner, but instead makes steady progress in advancing American interests. Our “risk management” approach to China outlined in this report focuses on real results by recognizing China’s growing importance to global problem-solving. We need to engage China’s leaders and the Chinese people in the urgent challenges of our time, including global warming. Without a serious commitment by the United States and China, humankind will not be able to avoid the most dire consequences of climate change. We cannot afford to continue with a reactive, piecemeal, and uncoordinated policy. Now is the time to embark upon a progressive strategy toward China.
Report Brief
The next four years offer a critical window of opportunity to forge an innovative, durable, pragmatic, and effective approach to U.S.-China relations. A progressive China policy will safeguard U.S. national security interests, encourage the emergence of a China that meets its responsibilities both to the international community and to its own people, and ensure that Americans as well as Chinese are able to enjoy a rising standard of living.
The ultimate goal of our China policy is the emergence of a China that adopts a cooperative and mutually beneficial relationship with the United States, and fulfills its responsibilities as a stakeholder in the global system by addressing the most urgent global challenges, such as tackling climate change, fighting weapons proliferation, and promoting global prosperity. Our China policy aims to encourage a China that develops over time a stable, equitable, and open domestic system—one that guarantees universal human rights, including social, political, economic, labor, and religious rights.
Given China’s uncertain future, the United States must always ensure that it retains adequate capabilities to respond to the variety of scenarios that fl ow from a strong and aggressive China or a weak and unstable one. But our policy toward China must also work toward renewing the international system of multilateral rules, norms, and institutions that has proven durable and effective in integrating new powers, growing the global economy, preserving the peace, promoting political pluralism, and safeguarding U.S. interests.
Many of these multilateral institutions need reform and adjustment, offering the United States an opportunity to recommit itself to this effort, and to draw China into these processes. The United States should work to include China as a more engaged and responsible global partner, give China a greater stake in the current system, and further bind China to the global success of these efforts. Working toward this goal is imperative because effective solutions to the most pressing problems of our time—global warming, terrorism, pandemic disease, expanding the global middle class, and nuclear nonproliferation—cannot happen without the full participation of the United States and China.
A Progressive Strategy: U.S. Strategic Goals
The next president and his administration must move beyond the current, China policy framework of “engaging but hedging.” Instead, we suggest a practical, forward-looking “risk management” strategy to forge a new phase in U.S.-China relations. Such an approach contains these core elements: embedding China in the international arena; managing the risk of China’s uncertain future trajectory; understanding and collaborating with China while engaging the rest of the world in dealing with China; and re-establishing U.S. moral authority and global economic competitiveness.
Embed China
The United States should move beyond the engagement strategy we’ve pursued for 30 years and seek China’s integration into the international system as a responsible, engaged, and respected stakeholder so it can address urgent global problems such as climate change. In the long run, this will strengthen the international system and will also help mold China’s behavior. The United States should signal to China that it understands China occupies an important place in the existing international order, that its development depends on the preservation of that order, and that the United States and the world expect China to fulfill its regional and international responsibilities. In return for China’s fulfi llment of more responsibilities, it will have greater opportunities to shape evolving norms, rules, and institutions.
Manage potential downside and upside risk
The United States must always ensure it retains adequate capacity, militarily and diplomatically, to handle a variety of scenarios that could result from China’s strengths and weaknesses. The uncertainties regarding China’s possible future pathways cut across a broad range of issues, from internal governance, to military modernization, to consumer protection, to nationalism, and to Taiwan. Indeed, the likeliest scenarios for the foreseeable future is a China with a “mixed record,” meeting U.S. expectations and requests in some areas, but falling short in others. We must be prepared for every contingency.
Better understand China
The United States must devote greater resources to understanding China, especially its leaders’ thinking and their priorities in foreign policy, domestic and economic policies, and military planning. Greater diplomatic, intelligence, and military assets should be devoted to this important task.
Collaborate with China
Common challenges, such as sustaining and broadening global economic growth, curbing climate change, staunching the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and combating infectious diseases, will require the United States and China and the international community to cooperate on large-scale, long-term policies.
While we must be clear when we have differences, the next president and his administration should seek to establish a collaborative relationship with China where possible, and dispel notions that the United States seeks to inhibit China’s peaceful development.
Cooperate with other nations to influence China
Persuading China to consider its global responsibilities has not been easy, but working through multilateral channels and building international pressure has effectively induced China to modify its stance, at times, on certain controversial issues, among them nonproliferation and dealing with North Korea. The United States must strengthen its ties with other nations and with global institutions when dealing with China on many issues, including global warming, human rights, international economic integration, and China’s opaque military buildup. On bilateral issues, prioritizing U.S. demands will be key to effectively eliciting results form China.
Reestablish U.S. moral authority
Key to effective bilateral relations with China is reestablishing U.S. moral authority and leadership around the globe. America’s ability to lead by example remains our most powerful asset. The United States must once again provide leadership and direction based on our nation’s fundamental values.
Prepare to compete globally
The United States can neither engage China from a position of strength nor guarantee U.S. competitiveness in a globalized world unless we put our own domestic house in order. To compete successfully amid rapid globalization, the United States must invest in key domestic priorities, among them transforming to a low-carbon economy, feeding our science and technology innovation engine, empowering workers to seize the opportunities of globalization, and ensuring that the next generation is well prepared to thrive.
U.S.-China Policy Priorities
The scope, breadth, and complexity of U.S.-China relations will require coordination and prioritization within the U.S. government—a critical and daunting task. It will require consistent high-level attention and engagement starting with the president. A commitment to regularized presidential-level meetings between the United States and China are necessary both to further strategic dialogue and consensus between our two nations, and to facilitate decisions on pressing issues that demand resolution. Given the array of issues at play in the relationship, we need coordinated policy making—in digestible portions—that addresses the multiplicity of political, security, and economic issues.
These separate but coordinated dialogues should each be headed by appropriate cabinet-level officials, and will be critical to assure that outstanding issues are addressed and strategic dialogue moves forward. And it is imperative that the next administration consult with Congress early and often to forge a coalition that can support a progressive China policy.
The next president should concentrate on six policy priorities in U.S.-China relations:
* Climate change and energy security
* Balanced and sustainable global growth
* Enhanced security in the Asia-Pacific region
* China’s military modernization
* Stability in the Taiwan Strait
* Governance and individual rights
Coordinating U.S. policy on China in these six arenas will demand that senior officials in the next administration manage Sino-U.S. relations across departments and in league with Congress. At the same time, engaging Chinese officials in a coordinated fashion will allow the United States to assess more easily the opportunities and risks inherent in U.S.-China relations at different working levels within China. This pragmatic approach will allow the United States to tackle the tough problems in our bilateral relations while engaging China on our common global interests.
Climate change and energy security
The next president and his administration have an unparalleled opportunity to engage China in a constructive partnership on climate change and energy security—an extraordinary and urgent challenge we face in this new century. The Bush administration’s shortsighted energy policies and refusal to commit to reductions in greenhouse gases prevented the United States from exploring and building on our two nations’ shared objectives. Tackling climate change in earnest offers the opportunity not only to safeguard the future of our environment but also to enhance the U.S.-China relationship by creating common ground on this critical issue. As the two largest emitters of greenhouse gases in the world, both nations must work together to find solutions that will stave off the most severe consequences of climate change. No international effort to address global warming will be successful without the full engagement of both countries.
Consequently, the next president should announce early in his administration that the United States will commit to substantial, mandatory reductions in U.S. greenhouse gas emissions that are not conditioned on the specific actions taken by China. At the same time, the president should make clear that China and other developing countries must assume meaningful, binding commitments to slow and ultimately reverse the growth of greenhouse gas emissions.
To lower its rate of emissions growth, China should commit to ambitious goals for improving energy efficiency, increasing renewable power, and accelerating deployment of advanced clean energy technologies. In addition, China should be pressed to agree to a fixed date by which it would begin reducing emissions in absolute terms. When coupled with the contributions of developed countries, these reductions should be of a magnitude sufficient to achieve an overall global emission reduction of 50 percent below 1990 levels by 2050.
The next president should make clear that, in parallel with far-reaching actions to reduce emissions, our government will protect the interests of U.S. workers in industries that could be placed at risk under a global climate change agreement if unequal cost burdens are imposed on producers in developed and developing countries. The extent of these measures to preserve U.S. competitiveness should depend on how far China goes to reduce its carbon footprint, which will in turn determine whether there is a level economic playing field for our major energy-intensive industries.
To reinforce our efforts to negotiate an acceptable global agreement, the next administration should work directly with China on mutually beneficial initiatives to improve environmental protection, stimulate deployment of clean-energy technologies, and enhance China’s technical and institutional capacity to address environmental and energy challenges. The next president should call for the two countries to immediately undertake a program of cooperative research and development on climate change and energy security, including demonstration projects to speed the deployment of advanced energy technologies. The new administration should also support mechanisms in U.S. climate legislation that create project-based carbon-emission credit opportunities for U.S. companies that allow them to offset their carbon emissions by investing in emission-reduction projects in developing countries.
Finally, our next president should signal the seriousness of our nation’s commitment to work with China as an equal to combat climate change and boost global energy security by pushing for greater and regular Chinese participation in the International Energy Agency. Successfully partnering with China on climate change and energy security on a bilateral basis and on the global stage holds the potential to create positive interactions between our two governments and our two peoples. This, in turn, could generate positive spillover across many aspects of our bilateral relationship.
Making progress on global warming and energy security could benefit our economy by creating new export opportunities for American clean energy companies. It would help promote human rights and civil society capacity-building by strengthening environmental nongovernment organizations and the ability of citizens to hold local leaders accountable for environmental degradation. And tackling climate change and energy security together will strengthen Asia-Pacific regional security and stability by highlighting an issue on which greater cooperation with Japan, a leader in energy efficiency, could be beneficial.
Balanced and sustainable global growth
The next administration will need to build a more equitable and mutually advantageous economic relationship with China. It must encourage China to be a more responsible steward of the international economic system, and to accelerate market-based economic and labor market reforms. But the next administration must also improve America’s own economic and technological competitiveness so that our country competes in the global economy from a more secure position of strength. An important measure of whether the next administration manages a successful economic relationship with China will be rising standards of living for a greater number of Americans, as well as a greater number of Chinese.
The next administration should use a high-level bilateral dialogue (like the ongoing Strategic Economic Dialogue initiated by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson) to sharpen the focus on a number of areas, including not just energy and climate but also enforcement of international trade and regulatory standards; institutional reforms including social safety nets and proper enforcement of labor standards; exchange rate policy; and compliance with international rules on foreign aid. The United States must also bring advancement of working conditions and labor rights into those discussions, and push for China to honor its commitments as a founding member of the International Labor Organization.
The United States must be prepared to use both multilateral and unilateral tools, such as the World Trade Organization and the International Trade Commission, to enforce economic agreements and standards. In addition, the United States, in concert with other nations, should propose that in exchange for China gaining a greater voice in international economic institutions such as the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, and the Group of Eight process, China will take further steps consistent with becoming a responsible steward of the global economic system.
At home, the next administration must renew our domestic competitiveness. America must invest in human capital and create a nimble, innovative workforce at every skill level. The United States must empower workers with the public policy tools they need to become an even more fl exible workforce, including universal health care, expanded unemployment benefits, and new jobs training programs, with a focus on the growth sectors of green jobs. We also must seek to restore economic mobility and put ourselves back on a path of fiscal responsibility.
Enhanced security in the Asia-Pacific region
To get national security policy toward China right, the United States needs to get its Asia-Pacific regional strategy right. Stability and security in East Asia is increasingly tied to overall U.S. national security goals; conflict and instability in East Asia would undermine a broad range of U.S. economic and security interests. The rise of China complicates the challenge of U.S. policy in the region, but it also affords us a chance to reinvigorate relations with our long-standing allies and partners in the region. U.S. political and diplomatic leverage in Asia depends on greater engagement.
The new administration should reaffirm the U.S. security commitment to allies and partners in the region. The United States should engage diplomatically with consistency at the highest levels to repair, revitalize, and bolster U.S. involvement in regional security, and economic and political affairs, leveraging traditional bilateral means and new multilateral forums. A first step would be signing the Association for South East Asian Nations’ Treaty of Amity and Cooperation, and, in the context of ongoing progress in the Six Party Talks, working with Japan, South Korea, and China to develop a permanent institution dealing with security issues in Northeast Asia. The United States must also work with China on shared regional interests, including rolling back the North Korean nuclear program.
China’s military modernization
China’s military modernization is focused on developing limited force projection capabilities alongside anti-access and area denial capabilities by leveraging advanced precision strike missiles, cyber-warfare, and anti-satellite weapons. Still, China suffers from very serious weaknesses in its military, including many obsolete weapon systems, a lack of battle experience, and not a single working aircraft carrier or military base outside of China—despite years of double-digit growth in its military budget.
The new president should task the Department of Defense with conducting an in-depth assessment of the ability of U.S. forces to fulfill our security commitments in the Western Pacific in the face of the Chinese military capabilities over the next decade. Based on that review, and in light of the toll Iraq has taken on the U.S. military, the new administration needs to develop a long-term defense program and strategy for U.S. basing and posture in the Western Pacific, and then make specific recommendations for investment, acquisitions, and procurements.
Greater trust and confidence between the United States and Chinese militaries will help contribute to greater strategic stability in the region. The United States should work with allies in the region to press China for greater transparency in its military modernization. The new administration should also intensify the strategic nuclear dialogue with China, deepen the high-level strategic dialogue on regional security issues, and initiate treaty discussions on weaponization and militarization of space. Additionally, the new administration should increase joint military capacity with allies in the region.
Stability in the Taiwan Strait
Taiwan is the most sensitive issue in the U.S.-China relationship. Despite recent improvements in tone and tenor of relations between Taipei and Beijing, Taiwan still remains an issue that could trigger greater tension and perhaps open armed confrontation between China and the United States. To Beijing, the island of Taiwan is the last piece of Chinese territory not reintegrated back into the nation after more than a century of struggle. But to the United States a thriving democratic Taiwan is linked to U.S. regional credibility and our democratic values.
Maintaining the now standard set of diplomatic assurances that offer a common language for Beijing and Washington and Taipei is an important starting point for any efforts to address cross-Strait issues. The United States should encourage Beijing and Taipei to continue building commercial, cultural, economic, and other ties to enhance confidence and trust in their interactions. We should also rebuild a relationship of trust with Taiwan and respond in accordance with the Taiwan Relations Act to appropriate Taiwanese requests to meet their defensive needs.
Governance and individual rights
China’s human rights record remains poor. China’s economic liberalization has lifted millions out of poverty, but progress toward political openness and pluralistic reform is incomplete, and in some ways regressing. Electoral reform at the local level seems stalled, and organized political dissent not tolerated. In other pockets, though, there is progress—the Chinese government is imposing more accountability on officials and providing more societal input into policy decisions.
Political and social change in China will largely need to come from within, but the United States can infl uence those developments. China’s desire to be treated as a respected member of the international community is a principal point of leverage for political change, as are China’s own governance needs and the aspirations of the Chinese people. What is required is a persistent but respectful witnessing to the universality of human rights, and encouraging other nations and groups of nations to reinforce concerns about China’s human rights, including labor rights practices.
The new administration should work with mechanisms that bring together international opinion to pressure China on human rights. The United States should enhance bilateral U.S.-China and EU-China human rights dialogue, and encourage China to ratify the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The new president should pledge that the United States will join, and thus strengthen, the UN Human Rights Council at which China’s record can be reviewed consistently, and support Chinese civil society and rule of law programs and China’s engagement with the International Labor Organization.
America must work to increase its leverage in the human rights arena by reclaiming our moral authority and leadership in the world. Chastising U.S. businesses or the Chinese government will achieve nothing if the United States doesn’t live up to its own principles. The next administration must work to re-establish U.S. moral authority and leadership, which has always been one of the strongest and most efficacious tools in the American foreign policy toolbox. Leading by example is a powerful avenue America can take. Without American leadership and authority, convincing China to change will be all the more difficult.
A progressive strategy for U.S.-China relations
The United States cannot determine China’s future; that task belongs to the Chinese people. But the United States can forge a relationship with China that delivers on American interests and the global common good by working with China to tackle our shared global problems, addressing our areas of difference in a sober and practical way, and facing up to our own challenges. Peacefully integrating China into the international order will embed this rising power in the web of norms and responsibilities that come with being an active participant in the world stage.
In the pages that follow, the authors of this report will detail the progressive strategic goals and top policy priorities we recommend to the new president and his administration. Our policy proposals are presented against the backdrop of current global and Sino-U.S. environmental, economic, and political realities. We believe the analysis and conclusions contained in this paper will prepare the United States to engage China effectively and assuredly in the decades to come.
An unsustainable environment
China's pollution problems are pervasive and costly
China’s environmental problems are enormous and growing worse by the day. China’s leadership has an enormous stake in finding sustainable solutions to its environmental and energy challenges for its own well-being. Unchecked global warming could have devastating consequences for China, and the country is already feeling the impact of horrific pollution problems on its people, government, and economy.
Costs to the economy
Studies conducted inside and outside of China have found that environmental degradation is costing the Chinese economy between 8 percent and 12 percent of gross domestic product each year. Natural disasters, which are up from years past, are said to cost China between 1 percent and 3 percent of GDP annually. Absenteeism, stemming from pollution-related health ailments, is also eating into the country’s productivity levels.
In China’s northern and western regions, desertification and water scarcity are slowing economic growth and limiting agricultural and industrial output. In a study conducted by the Chinese government, scientists found that China’s production of wheat, rice, and corn could decline by as much as 37 percent by the end of the century. Other countries, including the United States, are growing wary of purchasing Chinese products because of contamination by pollution and chemicals. And global warming is expected to bring severe flooding on China’s coastal areas, where 41 percent of China’s population, 60 percent of its wealth, and 70 percent of its megacities are located.
The health crisis
More than 500 million people in China—1.5 times the total U.S. population— live without access to clean water. Only 1 percent of the Chinese urban population breathes air considered safe by the European Union. An estimated 750,000 people die prematurely each year in China from breathing polluted air. And according to state-run media, “China will have the world’s highest number of lung cancer patients,” adding at a rate of “1 million a year by 2025 if smoking and pollution are not effectively curbed.”
Global warming will probably lead to higher rates of infectious disease in China. One Shanghai-based study concluded that the lethal H5N1 virus, also known as Avian Flu, will spread as climate change shifts the habitats and migratory patterns of birds. Another study, conducted by Harvard Medical School, highlighted the link between extreme weather events and the outbreak of diseases such as malaria, typhoid, cholera, and dengue fever. This has serious implications for China, as global warming is expected to result in major fl ooding on China’s heavily populated eastern seaboard. The Harvard study also found that warming climates will lead to the spread of disease-carrying insects such as deer ticks, which spread Lyme Disease and are prevalent in China.
Migration and environmental refugees
Global warming has accelerated desertification of China’s northern regions and exacerbated water scarcity. Regions that benefit from more abundant water sources will need to cope with an influx of migrants from water-scarce areas. One study by the United Nations projected that there could be as many as 50 million environmental refugees in China by 2010, many of them fleeing water shortages and sand dunes. Desertification will also add to the migration of rural Chinese looking for employment in already overcrowded and dangerously polluted urban centers. China’s current rural-to-urban migration constitutes the greatest migration in human history. Overpopulated urban centers will grow in size and population, becoming breeding grounds for disease.
Social unrest
In 2007, The Minister of Environmental Protection Zhou Shengxian reported yet another increase in the number of “mass incidents” related to pollution, citing an 8 percent increase in number of petitions submitted to his agency over the same time period in 2006. This is presumably up from more than 51,000 environment-related protests that occurred in China in 2005, or about 1,000 protests a week, according to an independent report.
Indeed, thousands of protestors took to the streets last year in Xiamen, an economic boomtown in China’s coastal Fujian province, to halt the construction of a chemical plant. This past May, hundreds marched against the building of an ethylene plant in the city of Chengdu, the capital of inland Sichuan province. Though this march was peaceful, the same cannot be said about all of the environment-related demonstrations around the country.
In response, China has elevated the State Environmental Protection Agency into a full-fledged cabinet-level ministry with access to the State Council’s decision-making process, more staff, and greater financial support. In March 2008, Zhou announced that the ministry will bolster its law enforcement capabilities with enhanced surveillance, stricter monitoring, regular meetings, joint enforcement, and information-sharing systems between environmental protection departments of all levels, as well as law enforcement and judicial bodies.
The severity of China’s pollution and climate change problems provide an opening for the United States to collaborate with China on this urgent set of challenges. Both countries have an interest in staving off the most severe consequences of environmental degradation, and both will benefit greatly from a constructive partnership in this arena. It is a global imperative that the next U.S. president work with China and the rest of the world to address China’s pollution problems and the world’s climate change crisis.
Also, here's the Brief
-Patricia
A Progressive Approach to U.S.-China Relations in the 21st Century
By Nina Hachigian, Michael Schiffer
Winny Chen | August 13, 2008
Memo to the next president
The choices you make as the next president will have a defi ning infl uence on the contours of U.S.-China relations and, ultimately, China’s trajectory as a rising power. Realizing the potential of the U.S.-China relationship, while guarding against future uncertainties, will constitute a central challenge of your presidency and of American foreign policy this century. Because China’s future remains deeply uncertain, we can assume neither that the stability nor the prosperity that have generally characterized U.S.-China relations for the past several decades will continue, nor that confl ict is inevitable.
As president, you will have to manage the many national security problems bequeathed to you by your predecessor, especially in Iraq and Afghanistan, alongside a struggling global economy. But China’s rise across nearly every dimension of power is a central strategic fact of the 21st century, and your choices will shape the geopolitical environment for a long time to come. While the United States cannot determine what path China takes, your administration can help create the global context for China’s peaceful rise.
Getting China strategy right from the beginning of your administration will be critical to a successful U.S. policy on China. Presidents Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush all entered the White House in the wake of presidential campaigns replete with promises to be “tougher” on China—only to embrace a more pragmatic approach once the realities of the relationship became apparent. All three presidents lost valuable time and political capital.
Today, rapid changes to the global economy, the outsourcing and offshoring of U.S. jobs to China, and overall U.S. economic weakness combine to give unique momentum to the case that you, too, should take a “tougher” stance. To be sure, we have many serious policy differences with China—on human rights, currency exchange rates, and Sudan, to name a few. Yet the urgency of our shared challenges, most particularly on the need for dramatic reductions in global carbon emissions, but also on North Korea and other issues, requires a results-oriented strategy from the beginning.
Thus, you must reject the alarmism that frequently clouds policy debates on U.S.-China relations and take a clear-eyed, practical approach that does not see ruin or victory around every corner, but instead makes steady progress in advancing American interests. Our “risk management” approach to China outlined in this report focuses on real results by recognizing China’s growing importance to global problem-solving. We need to engage China’s leaders and the Chinese people in the urgent challenges of our time, including global warming. Without a serious commitment by the United States and China, humankind will not be able to avoid the most dire consequences of climate change. We cannot afford to continue with a reactive, piecemeal, and uncoordinated policy. Now is the time to embark upon a progressive strategy toward China.
Report Brief
The next four years offer a critical window of opportunity to forge an innovative, durable, pragmatic, and effective approach to U.S.-China relations. A progressive China policy will safeguard U.S. national security interests, encourage the emergence of a China that meets its responsibilities both to the international community and to its own people, and ensure that Americans as well as Chinese are able to enjoy a rising standard of living.
The ultimate goal of our China policy is the emergence of a China that adopts a cooperative and mutually beneficial relationship with the United States, and fulfills its responsibilities as a stakeholder in the global system by addressing the most urgent global challenges, such as tackling climate change, fighting weapons proliferation, and promoting global prosperity. Our China policy aims to encourage a China that develops over time a stable, equitable, and open domestic system—one that guarantees universal human rights, including social, political, economic, labor, and religious rights.
Given China’s uncertain future, the United States must always ensure that it retains adequate capabilities to respond to the variety of scenarios that fl ow from a strong and aggressive China or a weak and unstable one. But our policy toward China must also work toward renewing the international system of multilateral rules, norms, and institutions that has proven durable and effective in integrating new powers, growing the global economy, preserving the peace, promoting political pluralism, and safeguarding U.S. interests.
Many of these multilateral institutions need reform and adjustment, offering the United States an opportunity to recommit itself to this effort, and to draw China into these processes. The United States should work to include China as a more engaged and responsible global partner, give China a greater stake in the current system, and further bind China to the global success of these efforts. Working toward this goal is imperative because effective solutions to the most pressing problems of our time—global warming, terrorism, pandemic disease, expanding the global middle class, and nuclear nonproliferation—cannot happen without the full participation of the United States and China.
A Progressive Strategy: U.S. Strategic Goals
The next president and his administration must move beyond the current, China policy framework of “engaging but hedging.” Instead, we suggest a practical, forward-looking “risk management” strategy to forge a new phase in U.S.-China relations. Such an approach contains these core elements: embedding China in the international arena; managing the risk of China’s uncertain future trajectory; understanding and collaborating with China while engaging the rest of the world in dealing with China; and re-establishing U.S. moral authority and global economic competitiveness.
Embed China
The United States should move beyond the engagement strategy we’ve pursued for 30 years and seek China’s integration into the international system as a responsible, engaged, and respected stakeholder so it can address urgent global problems such as climate change. In the long run, this will strengthen the international system and will also help mold China’s behavior. The United States should signal to China that it understands China occupies an important place in the existing international order, that its development depends on the preservation of that order, and that the United States and the world expect China to fulfill its regional and international responsibilities. In return for China’s fulfi llment of more responsibilities, it will have greater opportunities to shape evolving norms, rules, and institutions.
Manage potential downside and upside risk
The United States must always ensure it retains adequate capacity, militarily and diplomatically, to handle a variety of scenarios that could result from China’s strengths and weaknesses. The uncertainties regarding China’s possible future pathways cut across a broad range of issues, from internal governance, to military modernization, to consumer protection, to nationalism, and to Taiwan. Indeed, the likeliest scenarios for the foreseeable future is a China with a “mixed record,” meeting U.S. expectations and requests in some areas, but falling short in others. We must be prepared for every contingency.
Better understand China
The United States must devote greater resources to understanding China, especially its leaders’ thinking and their priorities in foreign policy, domestic and economic policies, and military planning. Greater diplomatic, intelligence, and military assets should be devoted to this important task.
Collaborate with China
Common challenges, such as sustaining and broadening global economic growth, curbing climate change, staunching the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and combating infectious diseases, will require the United States and China and the international community to cooperate on large-scale, long-term policies.
While we must be clear when we have differences, the next president and his administration should seek to establish a collaborative relationship with China where possible, and dispel notions that the United States seeks to inhibit China’s peaceful development.
Cooperate with other nations to influence China
Persuading China to consider its global responsibilities has not been easy, but working through multilateral channels and building international pressure has effectively induced China to modify its stance, at times, on certain controversial issues, among them nonproliferation and dealing with North Korea. The United States must strengthen its ties with other nations and with global institutions when dealing with China on many issues, including global warming, human rights, international economic integration, and China’s opaque military buildup. On bilateral issues, prioritizing U.S. demands will be key to effectively eliciting results form China.
Reestablish U.S. moral authority
Key to effective bilateral relations with China is reestablishing U.S. moral authority and leadership around the globe. America’s ability to lead by example remains our most powerful asset. The United States must once again provide leadership and direction based on our nation’s fundamental values.
Prepare to compete globally
The United States can neither engage China from a position of strength nor guarantee U.S. competitiveness in a globalized world unless we put our own domestic house in order. To compete successfully amid rapid globalization, the United States must invest in key domestic priorities, among them transforming to a low-carbon economy, feeding our science and technology innovation engine, empowering workers to seize the opportunities of globalization, and ensuring that the next generation is well prepared to thrive.
U.S.-China Policy Priorities
The scope, breadth, and complexity of U.S.-China relations will require coordination and prioritization within the U.S. government—a critical and daunting task. It will require consistent high-level attention and engagement starting with the president. A commitment to regularized presidential-level meetings between the United States and China are necessary both to further strategic dialogue and consensus between our two nations, and to facilitate decisions on pressing issues that demand resolution. Given the array of issues at play in the relationship, we need coordinated policy making—in digestible portions—that addresses the multiplicity of political, security, and economic issues.
These separate but coordinated dialogues should each be headed by appropriate cabinet-level officials, and will be critical to assure that outstanding issues are addressed and strategic dialogue moves forward. And it is imperative that the next administration consult with Congress early and often to forge a coalition that can support a progressive China policy.
The next president should concentrate on six policy priorities in U.S.-China relations:
* Climate change and energy security
* Balanced and sustainable global growth
* Enhanced security in the Asia-Pacific region
* China’s military modernization
* Stability in the Taiwan Strait
* Governance and individual rights
Coordinating U.S. policy on China in these six arenas will demand that senior officials in the next administration manage Sino-U.S. relations across departments and in league with Congress. At the same time, engaging Chinese officials in a coordinated fashion will allow the United States to assess more easily the opportunities and risks inherent in U.S.-China relations at different working levels within China. This pragmatic approach will allow the United States to tackle the tough problems in our bilateral relations while engaging China on our common global interests.
Climate change and energy security
The next president and his administration have an unparalleled opportunity to engage China in a constructive partnership on climate change and energy security—an extraordinary and urgent challenge we face in this new century. The Bush administration’s shortsighted energy policies and refusal to commit to reductions in greenhouse gases prevented the United States from exploring and building on our two nations’ shared objectives. Tackling climate change in earnest offers the opportunity not only to safeguard the future of our environment but also to enhance the U.S.-China relationship by creating common ground on this critical issue. As the two largest emitters of greenhouse gases in the world, both nations must work together to find solutions that will stave off the most severe consequences of climate change. No international effort to address global warming will be successful without the full engagement of both countries.
Consequently, the next president should announce early in his administration that the United States will commit to substantial, mandatory reductions in U.S. greenhouse gas emissions that are not conditioned on the specific actions taken by China. At the same time, the president should make clear that China and other developing countries must assume meaningful, binding commitments to slow and ultimately reverse the growth of greenhouse gas emissions.
To lower its rate of emissions growth, China should commit to ambitious goals for improving energy efficiency, increasing renewable power, and accelerating deployment of advanced clean energy technologies. In addition, China should be pressed to agree to a fixed date by which it would begin reducing emissions in absolute terms. When coupled with the contributions of developed countries, these reductions should be of a magnitude sufficient to achieve an overall global emission reduction of 50 percent below 1990 levels by 2050.
The next president should make clear that, in parallel with far-reaching actions to reduce emissions, our government will protect the interests of U.S. workers in industries that could be placed at risk under a global climate change agreement if unequal cost burdens are imposed on producers in developed and developing countries. The extent of these measures to preserve U.S. competitiveness should depend on how far China goes to reduce its carbon footprint, which will in turn determine whether there is a level economic playing field for our major energy-intensive industries.
To reinforce our efforts to negotiate an acceptable global agreement, the next administration should work directly with China on mutually beneficial initiatives to improve environmental protection, stimulate deployment of clean-energy technologies, and enhance China’s technical and institutional capacity to address environmental and energy challenges. The next president should call for the two countries to immediately undertake a program of cooperative research and development on climate change and energy security, including demonstration projects to speed the deployment of advanced energy technologies. The new administration should also support mechanisms in U.S. climate legislation that create project-based carbon-emission credit opportunities for U.S. companies that allow them to offset their carbon emissions by investing in emission-reduction projects in developing countries.
Finally, our next president should signal the seriousness of our nation’s commitment to work with China as an equal to combat climate change and boost global energy security by pushing for greater and regular Chinese participation in the International Energy Agency. Successfully partnering with China on climate change and energy security on a bilateral basis and on the global stage holds the potential to create positive interactions between our two governments and our two peoples. This, in turn, could generate positive spillover across many aspects of our bilateral relationship.
Making progress on global warming and energy security could benefit our economy by creating new export opportunities for American clean energy companies. It would help promote human rights and civil society capacity-building by strengthening environmental nongovernment organizations and the ability of citizens to hold local leaders accountable for environmental degradation. And tackling climate change and energy security together will strengthen Asia-Pacific regional security and stability by highlighting an issue on which greater cooperation with Japan, a leader in energy efficiency, could be beneficial.
Balanced and sustainable global growth
The next administration will need to build a more equitable and mutually advantageous economic relationship with China. It must encourage China to be a more responsible steward of the international economic system, and to accelerate market-based economic and labor market reforms. But the next administration must also improve America’s own economic and technological competitiveness so that our country competes in the global economy from a more secure position of strength. An important measure of whether the next administration manages a successful economic relationship with China will be rising standards of living for a greater number of Americans, as well as a greater number of Chinese.
The next administration should use a high-level bilateral dialogue (like the ongoing Strategic Economic Dialogue initiated by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson) to sharpen the focus on a number of areas, including not just energy and climate but also enforcement of international trade and regulatory standards; institutional reforms including social safety nets and proper enforcement of labor standards; exchange rate policy; and compliance with international rules on foreign aid. The United States must also bring advancement of working conditions and labor rights into those discussions, and push for China to honor its commitments as a founding member of the International Labor Organization.
The United States must be prepared to use both multilateral and unilateral tools, such as the World Trade Organization and the International Trade Commission, to enforce economic agreements and standards. In addition, the United States, in concert with other nations, should propose that in exchange for China gaining a greater voice in international economic institutions such as the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, and the Group of Eight process, China will take further steps consistent with becoming a responsible steward of the global economic system.
At home, the next administration must renew our domestic competitiveness. America must invest in human capital and create a nimble, innovative workforce at every skill level. The United States must empower workers with the public policy tools they need to become an even more fl exible workforce, including universal health care, expanded unemployment benefits, and new jobs training programs, with a focus on the growth sectors of green jobs. We also must seek to restore economic mobility and put ourselves back on a path of fiscal responsibility.
Enhanced security in the Asia-Pacific region
To get national security policy toward China right, the United States needs to get its Asia-Pacific regional strategy right. Stability and security in East Asia is increasingly tied to overall U.S. national security goals; conflict and instability in East Asia would undermine a broad range of U.S. economic and security interests. The rise of China complicates the challenge of U.S. policy in the region, but it also affords us a chance to reinvigorate relations with our long-standing allies and partners in the region. U.S. political and diplomatic leverage in Asia depends on greater engagement.
The new administration should reaffirm the U.S. security commitment to allies and partners in the region. The United States should engage diplomatically with consistency at the highest levels to repair, revitalize, and bolster U.S. involvement in regional security, and economic and political affairs, leveraging traditional bilateral means and new multilateral forums. A first step would be signing the Association for South East Asian Nations’ Treaty of Amity and Cooperation, and, in the context of ongoing progress in the Six Party Talks, working with Japan, South Korea, and China to develop a permanent institution dealing with security issues in Northeast Asia. The United States must also work with China on shared regional interests, including rolling back the North Korean nuclear program.
China’s military modernization
China’s military modernization is focused on developing limited force projection capabilities alongside anti-access and area denial capabilities by leveraging advanced precision strike missiles, cyber-warfare, and anti-satellite weapons. Still, China suffers from very serious weaknesses in its military, including many obsolete weapon systems, a lack of battle experience, and not a single working aircraft carrier or military base outside of China—despite years of double-digit growth in its military budget.
The new president should task the Department of Defense with conducting an in-depth assessment of the ability of U.S. forces to fulfill our security commitments in the Western Pacific in the face of the Chinese military capabilities over the next decade. Based on that review, and in light of the toll Iraq has taken on the U.S. military, the new administration needs to develop a long-term defense program and strategy for U.S. basing and posture in the Western Pacific, and then make specific recommendations for investment, acquisitions, and procurements.
Greater trust and confidence between the United States and Chinese militaries will help contribute to greater strategic stability in the region. The United States should work with allies in the region to press China for greater transparency in its military modernization. The new administration should also intensify the strategic nuclear dialogue with China, deepen the high-level strategic dialogue on regional security issues, and initiate treaty discussions on weaponization and militarization of space. Additionally, the new administration should increase joint military capacity with allies in the region.
Stability in the Taiwan Strait
Taiwan is the most sensitive issue in the U.S.-China relationship. Despite recent improvements in tone and tenor of relations between Taipei and Beijing, Taiwan still remains an issue that could trigger greater tension and perhaps open armed confrontation between China and the United States. To Beijing, the island of Taiwan is the last piece of Chinese territory not reintegrated back into the nation after more than a century of struggle. But to the United States a thriving democratic Taiwan is linked to U.S. regional credibility and our democratic values.
Maintaining the now standard set of diplomatic assurances that offer a common language for Beijing and Washington and Taipei is an important starting point for any efforts to address cross-Strait issues. The United States should encourage Beijing and Taipei to continue building commercial, cultural, economic, and other ties to enhance confidence and trust in their interactions. We should also rebuild a relationship of trust with Taiwan and respond in accordance with the Taiwan Relations Act to appropriate Taiwanese requests to meet their defensive needs.
Governance and individual rights
China’s human rights record remains poor. China’s economic liberalization has lifted millions out of poverty, but progress toward political openness and pluralistic reform is incomplete, and in some ways regressing. Electoral reform at the local level seems stalled, and organized political dissent not tolerated. In other pockets, though, there is progress—the Chinese government is imposing more accountability on officials and providing more societal input into policy decisions.
Political and social change in China will largely need to come from within, but the United States can infl uence those developments. China’s desire to be treated as a respected member of the international community is a principal point of leverage for political change, as are China’s own governance needs and the aspirations of the Chinese people. What is required is a persistent but respectful witnessing to the universality of human rights, and encouraging other nations and groups of nations to reinforce concerns about China’s human rights, including labor rights practices.
The new administration should work with mechanisms that bring together international opinion to pressure China on human rights. The United States should enhance bilateral U.S.-China and EU-China human rights dialogue, and encourage China to ratify the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The new president should pledge that the United States will join, and thus strengthen, the UN Human Rights Council at which China’s record can be reviewed consistently, and support Chinese civil society and rule of law programs and China’s engagement with the International Labor Organization.
America must work to increase its leverage in the human rights arena by reclaiming our moral authority and leadership in the world. Chastising U.S. businesses or the Chinese government will achieve nothing if the United States doesn’t live up to its own principles. The next administration must work to re-establish U.S. moral authority and leadership, which has always been one of the strongest and most efficacious tools in the American foreign policy toolbox. Leading by example is a powerful avenue America can take. Without American leadership and authority, convincing China to change will be all the more difficult.
A progressive strategy for U.S.-China relations
The United States cannot determine China’s future; that task belongs to the Chinese people. But the United States can forge a relationship with China that delivers on American interests and the global common good by working with China to tackle our shared global problems, addressing our areas of difference in a sober and practical way, and facing up to our own challenges. Peacefully integrating China into the international order will embed this rising power in the web of norms and responsibilities that come with being an active participant in the world stage.
In the pages that follow, the authors of this report will detail the progressive strategic goals and top policy priorities we recommend to the new president and his administration. Our policy proposals are presented against the backdrop of current global and Sino-U.S. environmental, economic, and political realities. We believe the analysis and conclusions contained in this paper will prepare the United States to engage China effectively and assuredly in the decades to come.
An unsustainable environment
China's pollution problems are pervasive and costly
China’s environmental problems are enormous and growing worse by the day. China’s leadership has an enormous stake in finding sustainable solutions to its environmental and energy challenges for its own well-being. Unchecked global warming could have devastating consequences for China, and the country is already feeling the impact of horrific pollution problems on its people, government, and economy.
Costs to the economy
Studies conducted inside and outside of China have found that environmental degradation is costing the Chinese economy between 8 percent and 12 percent of gross domestic product each year. Natural disasters, which are up from years past, are said to cost China between 1 percent and 3 percent of GDP annually. Absenteeism, stemming from pollution-related health ailments, is also eating into the country’s productivity levels.
In China’s northern and western regions, desertification and water scarcity are slowing economic growth and limiting agricultural and industrial output. In a study conducted by the Chinese government, scientists found that China’s production of wheat, rice, and corn could decline by as much as 37 percent by the end of the century. Other countries, including the United States, are growing wary of purchasing Chinese products because of contamination by pollution and chemicals. And global warming is expected to bring severe flooding on China’s coastal areas, where 41 percent of China’s population, 60 percent of its wealth, and 70 percent of its megacities are located.
The health crisis
More than 500 million people in China—1.5 times the total U.S. population— live without access to clean water. Only 1 percent of the Chinese urban population breathes air considered safe by the European Union. An estimated 750,000 people die prematurely each year in China from breathing polluted air. And according to state-run media, “China will have the world’s highest number of lung cancer patients,” adding at a rate of “1 million a year by 2025 if smoking and pollution are not effectively curbed.”
Global warming will probably lead to higher rates of infectious disease in China. One Shanghai-based study concluded that the lethal H5N1 virus, also known as Avian Flu, will spread as climate change shifts the habitats and migratory patterns of birds. Another study, conducted by Harvard Medical School, highlighted the link between extreme weather events and the outbreak of diseases such as malaria, typhoid, cholera, and dengue fever. This has serious implications for China, as global warming is expected to result in major fl ooding on China’s heavily populated eastern seaboard. The Harvard study also found that warming climates will lead to the spread of disease-carrying insects such as deer ticks, which spread Lyme Disease and are prevalent in China.
Migration and environmental refugees
Global warming has accelerated desertification of China’s northern regions and exacerbated water scarcity. Regions that benefit from more abundant water sources will need to cope with an influx of migrants from water-scarce areas. One study by the United Nations projected that there could be as many as 50 million environmental refugees in China by 2010, many of them fleeing water shortages and sand dunes. Desertification will also add to the migration of rural Chinese looking for employment in already overcrowded and dangerously polluted urban centers. China’s current rural-to-urban migration constitutes the greatest migration in human history. Overpopulated urban centers will grow in size and population, becoming breeding grounds for disease.
Social unrest
In 2007, The Minister of Environmental Protection Zhou Shengxian reported yet another increase in the number of “mass incidents” related to pollution, citing an 8 percent increase in number of petitions submitted to his agency over the same time period in 2006. This is presumably up from more than 51,000 environment-related protests that occurred in China in 2005, or about 1,000 protests a week, according to an independent report.
Indeed, thousands of protestors took to the streets last year in Xiamen, an economic boomtown in China’s coastal Fujian province, to halt the construction of a chemical plant. This past May, hundreds marched against the building of an ethylene plant in the city of Chengdu, the capital of inland Sichuan province. Though this march was peaceful, the same cannot be said about all of the environment-related demonstrations around the country.
In response, China has elevated the State Environmental Protection Agency into a full-fledged cabinet-level ministry with access to the State Council’s decision-making process, more staff, and greater financial support. In March 2008, Zhou announced that the ministry will bolster its law enforcement capabilities with enhanced surveillance, stricter monitoring, regular meetings, joint enforcement, and information-sharing systems between environmental protection departments of all levels, as well as law enforcement and judicial bodies.
The severity of China’s pollution and climate change problems provide an opening for the United States to collaborate with China on this urgent set of challenges. Both countries have an interest in staving off the most severe consequences of environmental degradation, and both will benefit greatly from a constructive partnership in this arena. It is a global imperative that the next U.S. president work with China and the rest of the world to address China’s pollution problems and the world’s climate change crisis.
ELL students' class time isn't great, but it's 'good enough'
By Rhonda Bodfield
ARIZONA DAILY STAR
08.30.2008
When school started this year, districts across the state were supposed to put students with poor or non-existent English skills into language-development classes for four hours a day.
Mostly, it's not happening.
In part, it's because there were a number of exceptions written into the plan so schools with few English learners or schools participating in certain approved reading programs are excluded from the requirement.
Also, districts are having a hard time pulling it off with available resources. Although the districts submitted funding requests of about $274 million, the state set aside $40 million. And some districts, such as the Tucson Unified School District, received no new money to comply with the new law.
Of the 75 elementary schools in TUSD, for example, only 29 would technically be required to have four-hour blocks. Fewer than five are pulling it off, said Steve Holmes, the chief academic officer in charge of the English-learners program.
Holmes, who said the district needed 100 new positions to be able to fully comply, has set up a meeting with officials from the state Education Department to explain that despite good-faith efforts, this year is simply going to have to be a transition year.
"We're willing to do it, but we're between a rock and a hard place because we don't have the resources to do four hours across the board," he said. "We're doing the best we can, and this year that's going to have to be good enough."
"Good enough" appears to be close enough this time around.
Tom Horne, the state schools chief, said although the four-hour standard is not being universally met, none of the districts is being "defiant."
"My people tell me that the districts are all making a good-faith effort, and we're going to use common sense in making sure that they become fully compliant within a reasonable time," Horne said.
He remains convinced it's a good plan and said he anticipates that students will get reclassified faster out of remedial English classes. Previously, he said, some schools offered only half an hour of language development a day. "It's going to be one of the most important things we've done in education in Arizona for a long time," he said. "The rate at which students are going to be learning English is going to soar."
Horne points to the success of some districts that started the new model early. The Florence Unified School District, for example, was able to reclassify 38 percent of its English learners after a year of the program, more than double its earlier reclassification rate of 15 percent. Humboldt Unified School District, near Prescott, went from 12 percent to 28 percent, he said.
In Tucson, one of the few schools in which the model is in full bloom is Cragin Elementary School, 2945 N. Tucson Blvd., where school officials are skeptical but complying.
Principal Pearl Miller cited a number of concerns.
Putting only English learners in one class together means that some classes are quite small. In third and fourth grade, for example, there are 18 students per class. Other mainstream classes, though, get stuffed full.
With only about six hours of instructional time in a day, she said, working on language skills for four hours doesn't leave much time for other subjects, especially since the school has decided all students should continue getting an hour of math.
And finally, there's the philosophical concern about isolating students from their English-speaking counterparts.
"Our staff is well-trained and committed, and logistically we are able to do it, but we don't really feel good about the segregation that's occurring. It's hard for us to say we're proud of our diversity here, and then say, 'Over here, in this separate room, is where we teach our students learning English,' " she said.
Saralinda Mendivil, a fourth-grade teacher who has taught at Cragin for seven years, said she is thrilled with the smaller class size because classroom management comes easier and she's able to give students more individualized attention. Still, she continues to have reservations.
"Philosophically, we believe that everyone learns from each other," she said, adding that in a more traditional classroom, English-speaking students could partner with those with fewer language skills and model for them. "They're still able to help each other at different levels, but if you want a true model, they should be around other English-speaking children."
Last year, she said, her fourth-graders already were doing a good deal of work to prepare for the science portion of the AIMS test, which got off the ground last year. This year, she's squeezing it in when she can, along with social studies and history when possible.
"They're still getting some exposure, but not in the way that would serve them the best."
Horne said teaching language skills doesn't mean core academics must be neglected. Instead, language skills should be incorporated into those subjects, he said. "Secondly, it's four hours, so there are still two more hours for other subjects," he said, adding there's always summer school if students still need to catch up.
Cragin parent Karla Muñoz, 36, said her 6-year-old first-grader, Keiji, is happier this year than he was in kindergarten last year. "I think it's better," the native Spanish speaker said.
"Last year, he didn't like getting pulled out. He kept asking why he had to leave and what the other students were doing while he was gone. He feels better about it now, because he doesn't feel so different."
Teacher Mendivil acknowledged that the students didn't like the pull-out. She said when she explained at the beginning of the year how things were going to work, a cheer went up when she told them they wouldn't be taken out of class for separate language development.
But, she said, the students also realized right away that they were separated from their old friends.
"I tried to just be forthright with them. I told them they should never be ashamed of their culture and their language, but they're here in the United States and we need to make sure they can master the language so they can succeed."
ARIZONA DAILY STAR
08.30.2008
When school started this year, districts across the state were supposed to put students with poor or non-existent English skills into language-development classes for four hours a day.
Mostly, it's not happening.
In part, it's because there were a number of exceptions written into the plan so schools with few English learners or schools participating in certain approved reading programs are excluded from the requirement.
Also, districts are having a hard time pulling it off with available resources. Although the districts submitted funding requests of about $274 million, the state set aside $40 million. And some districts, such as the Tucson Unified School District, received no new money to comply with the new law.
Of the 75 elementary schools in TUSD, for example, only 29 would technically be required to have four-hour blocks. Fewer than five are pulling it off, said Steve Holmes, the chief academic officer in charge of the English-learners program.
Holmes, who said the district needed 100 new positions to be able to fully comply, has set up a meeting with officials from the state Education Department to explain that despite good-faith efforts, this year is simply going to have to be a transition year.
"We're willing to do it, but we're between a rock and a hard place because we don't have the resources to do four hours across the board," he said. "We're doing the best we can, and this year that's going to have to be good enough."
"Good enough" appears to be close enough this time around.
Tom Horne, the state schools chief, said although the four-hour standard is not being universally met, none of the districts is being "defiant."
"My people tell me that the districts are all making a good-faith effort, and we're going to use common sense in making sure that they become fully compliant within a reasonable time," Horne said.
He remains convinced it's a good plan and said he anticipates that students will get reclassified faster out of remedial English classes. Previously, he said, some schools offered only half an hour of language development a day. "It's going to be one of the most important things we've done in education in Arizona for a long time," he said. "The rate at which students are going to be learning English is going to soar."
Horne points to the success of some districts that started the new model early. The Florence Unified School District, for example, was able to reclassify 38 percent of its English learners after a year of the program, more than double its earlier reclassification rate of 15 percent. Humboldt Unified School District, near Prescott, went from 12 percent to 28 percent, he said.
In Tucson, one of the few schools in which the model is in full bloom is Cragin Elementary School, 2945 N. Tucson Blvd., where school officials are skeptical but complying.
Principal Pearl Miller cited a number of concerns.
Putting only English learners in one class together means that some classes are quite small. In third and fourth grade, for example, there are 18 students per class. Other mainstream classes, though, get stuffed full.
With only about six hours of instructional time in a day, she said, working on language skills for four hours doesn't leave much time for other subjects, especially since the school has decided all students should continue getting an hour of math.
And finally, there's the philosophical concern about isolating students from their English-speaking counterparts.
"Our staff is well-trained and committed, and logistically we are able to do it, but we don't really feel good about the segregation that's occurring. It's hard for us to say we're proud of our diversity here, and then say, 'Over here, in this separate room, is where we teach our students learning English,' " she said.
Saralinda Mendivil, a fourth-grade teacher who has taught at Cragin for seven years, said she is thrilled with the smaller class size because classroom management comes easier and she's able to give students more individualized attention. Still, she continues to have reservations.
"Philosophically, we believe that everyone learns from each other," she said, adding that in a more traditional classroom, English-speaking students could partner with those with fewer language skills and model for them. "They're still able to help each other at different levels, but if you want a true model, they should be around other English-speaking children."
Last year, she said, her fourth-graders already were doing a good deal of work to prepare for the science portion of the AIMS test, which got off the ground last year. This year, she's squeezing it in when she can, along with social studies and history when possible.
"They're still getting some exposure, but not in the way that would serve them the best."
Horne said teaching language skills doesn't mean core academics must be neglected. Instead, language skills should be incorporated into those subjects, he said. "Secondly, it's four hours, so there are still two more hours for other subjects," he said, adding there's always summer school if students still need to catch up.
Cragin parent Karla Muñoz, 36, said her 6-year-old first-grader, Keiji, is happier this year than he was in kindergarten last year. "I think it's better," the native Spanish speaker said.
"Last year, he didn't like getting pulled out. He kept asking why he had to leave and what the other students were doing while he was gone. He feels better about it now, because he doesn't feel so different."
Teacher Mendivil acknowledged that the students didn't like the pull-out. She said when she explained at the beginning of the year how things were going to work, a cheer went up when she told them they wouldn't be taken out of class for separate language development.
But, she said, the students also realized right away that they were separated from their old friends.
"I tried to just be forthright with them. I told them they should never be ashamed of their culture and their language, but they're here in the United States and we need to make sure they can master the language so they can succeed."
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