Spanish Language Saga continues...alas.

Letter to the new principal:

Dear Rabbi Sinoff,

On Friday, the parents of high school students were given a list of offered courses for the 2011-2012 school year to help our children to choose the classes and sign the list.

With astonishment and disbelief we have found that much discussed Spanish Language course is offered online. After numerous discussions with the board and on the Beren Academy parents blog

http://berenparents.blogspot.com/2010/08/where-is-spanish-course.html#comments

http://berenparents.blogspot.com/2010/09/end-of-spanish-course-saga.html#comment

our request of having a real teacher was again disregarded. Students need another foreign language as an elective which was discussed in depth with parents and teachers during the previous year. 4 of our 6 children had successfully taken the Spanish course in high school at Beren.

Knowledge of foreign languages increases thе chance of getting into good universities exponentially. For example, it did help our 3 older children to receive a scholarship at Brandeis University and they were always grateful for the fact that they knew Hebrew, Spanish and Russian.

We hope that you, being a graduate of Columbia University with a B.A. in classical Greek, have an appreciation and knowledge of languages and will hire a native speaking Spanish teacher for our high school students.

All public and private schools in US offer foreign language as an elective to its high school students. Our students deserve no less.

Sincerely yours, the Concerned Parents.

The End of the Spanish Course Saga

Today is the birthday of Miguel de Cervantes, the author of Don Quixote, who wrote these words:

“Hechas, pues, estas prevenciones, no quiso aguardar más tiempo a poner en efeto su pensamiento, apretándole a ello la falta que él pensaba que hacía en el mundo su tardanza, según eran los agravios que pensaba deshacer, tuertos que enderezar, sinrazones que emendar, y abusos que mejorar y deudas que satisfacer.”

“Having, then made all these preparations, he did not wish to lose any time in putting his plan into effect, for he could not but blame himself for what the world was losing by his delay, so many were the wrongs that were to be righted, the grievances to be redressed, the abuses to be done away with, and the duties to be performed. “

We, too, can summarize our adventure.

Having been the subject of the three weeks of procrastinations that led nowhere, promises that were not fulfilled, and misleading messages that served to confuse, we can state that the Spanish I Course is not being offered. This issue discussed in depth in the e-mails with the principal and the Board, as well as on the Beren Parents Blog. Finances offered to the school, teachers suggested. Nine students in a high school of 70 being a significant group, their serious interest in learning Spanish disregarded.

The book which Harold Bloom calls the “first and finest modern novel, of cosmic significance” will remain closed to the students, who, if they do not start learning Spanish in 11th grade, will not be able to master the language before graduation.

Parents, who work hard and contribute significantly to the school's budget, still had their children deprived of a course that is offered for free in public schools all over the USA. And to think that the course would only cost $5,000-$10,000!

One can only conclude with another quote from the same book:

"The reason for the unreason with which you treat my reason , so weakens my reason that with reason I complain of your beauty" - "la razón de la sinrazón que a mi razón se hace, de tal manera mi razón enflaquece, que con razón me quejo de la vuestra fermosura."

Where is the Spanish Course?

It has been a week that we are discussing a point that should be obvious: any high school, public or private, must have a real foreign language course. Not an online course, but a serious instructor course with live interaction, feedback, exams, and peer learning. Online courses are not what private schools are all about. They can be taken at home, without paying a school tuition, or even going to school.

The mark of a good school is not how much money in scholarships it collects or gives, but in the quality and the achievements of its students. In the 24 years of being parents of Beren Academy students, the question of having or not having a foreign language course never came up, and we never needed to discuss the merit and importance of it with the previous administrations. To deprive the students of this important part of curriculum is to diminish their chances of getting into good universities, and excelling in their future careers.

Our four older children excelled in foreign languages in high school. It was a powerful factor in their receiving scholarships at Brandeis, Yale, and other universities. Our older daughters teach Jewish children from many countries and talk to them in their native tongues. On many occasions they expressed deep gratitude to us and the school for their multi-language education. They touched lives of many Jews from around the world and continue to do so.