Sink or Swim: What Happened to California's Bilingual Students after Proposition 227?

Abstract

Proposition 227, passed by California voters in 1998, aimed to dismantle bilingual programs in public schools and to replace them with English-only programs. Bilingual education, a long-standing program in California, involved mostly Hispanic students of limited English skills who were taught initially in their native language, and then were gradually transitioned into English-only classes. Using individual-level data from one southern California school district, I find that in 1998, before Proposition 227, limited-English-proficient (LEP) students enrolled in bilingual classes had lower scores in reading than LEP students who were not enrolled in bilingual classes, and who were, in general, more proficient in English. In math, bilingual students had test scores as good as those of non-bilingual LEPs. But in 1999, after Proposition 227, the same set of bilingual students had reading and math scores that were no worse than those of non-bilingual LEPs. Proposition 227, which interrupted bilingual programs and emphasized English instruction, did not set bilingual LEP students back relative to non-bilingual LEPs, and it may have even benefited them.