Ocean View Parents of Chinese After-School Program Frustrated About Loss of Language Instructor

One by one, parents of many children in Ocean View Elementary School's Chinese after-school care program addressed the Board of Education on Tuesday night to express concern about the loss of one of two Chinese-speaking teachers for students.

The Albany Unified School District replaced one of the teachers this fall with a non-Chinese speaking paraeducator, parents said. Parents said they pay $540 per month for the program; last year the fee was $480.

School district officials said the decision was prompted by budget cuts, seniority issues and pending union negotiations, and that they were working to resolve the situation. They said they could not discuss the matter because negotiations are still in process. They added that the item could not be added to the board's agenda because it relates to negotiations.

"There's going to be some bargaining and you're going to have to wait," said school board member Miriam Walden.

Parents said they were dismayed this fall to learn from children that one of two teachers in the program had been replaced by a paraeducator with no background in Chinese. Parents gave the board a petition indicating their belief in the need for a hasty resolution to the staffing changes.

Eugene Lee said, for his daughter, the Chinese instruction is "more than just a language program."

"We don't speak Chinese to her at home," he said. "It's important for our child to learn the sounds her grandparents made.... When I pick her up, it's basically just daycare. They're not actually speaking Chinese."

Parents said previously the program offered a rich course of instruction in language and culture for the more than 30 students who participate. 

"The teachers were terrific. There were wonderful programs in this community and several festivals last year," said Ling Xue. "We came from China. One of the most important things for us is to have our children grow up learning Chinese.

"We were shocked when our daughter told us, 'The teacher doesn't speak or understand Chinese.' She asked me, 'Teacher doesn't understand Chinese, how can she teach me?' .... We feel our children should not suffer so much from this problem."

Evaon Wong-Kim said this wasn't the first time the district failed to communicate with parents about changes to the program.

"There's a lack of communication that has always consistently been a problem," she said. "We were not told about this. We found out the first day we came back (to school)."

Wong-Kim said, given the long waiting list for the program, she thought the district should have "worked harder" to expand the program and make it available to a "long waiting list" of students. She added that the district had failed to ask for help from parents who could have stepped in.

"We might have creative ideas as a groups," she said. "Parents could help volunteer.... It doesn't have to be 'This is it, take the highway or my way.'"

After hearing from a number of frustrated parents, board member David Glasser said the issue appeared to be deeper than just a concern about changes in instruction.

"There's the assertion that there's been some cultural insensitivty... some discriminatory issues that are being raised," he said, as parents in the audience nodded. "But these board members have been working to maintain the programs."

School board members have been struggling throughout the summer, said board member Walden, to scramble to save the district's after-school programs in the wake of , to subsidies  that help provide child care for parents throughout California.  

Many parents said they understood the district is in a difficult spot, but added that they found the current teaching situation unacceptable. Putting a non-Chinese-speaking teacher in the program is like sending "a heart surgeon to go operate on eyes," one mother told the board.

Parents said the new teacher is very nice, but argued that it didn't make sense to have someone helping run the program who doesn't have the appropriate language skills.

"It just strikes me that it's not logical on any level that this should be happening," said Eugene Lee. "It certainly does seem like... this has to remedied. If we have to sit here every night, that seems like what's going to end up happening."