226 CHAPTER 7
minishing. Again turning to California, which often is an early indicator of
trends, the population in 1970 was 80% white; by 1998, it had dropped to just
over 50% (Reyes, 2001). What I have observed in many schools with a predom-
inantly Hispanic student body is that some white students use Chicano English
in order to fit in. Frequently, anyone—white, black, or Hispanic—who uses
Standard English is ostracized by peers. The mysterious popularity of
“gangster chic” has exacerbated this unfortunate situation.
The role language plays in personal and cultural identity has motivated nu-
merous well-meaning educators to argue that our schools should not teach Stan-
dard English or expect students to master its conventions. In 1974, the National
Council of Teachers of English (NCTE), for example, passed a resolution pro-
claiming that students have a right to their own language and arguing that con-
ventions of Standard English should be abolished because they are elitist and/or
discriminatory.^1 Although this resolution originally sought to address the diffi-
culties of our black students whose home dialect is BEV, some teachers feel that
it is even more relevant today, in the face of uncontrolled immigration from Mex-
ico, Central America, and China that has altered the very foundation of public ed-
ucation by creating student populations at many schools that are 100% nonnative
English speaking. The link between education and income, however, cannot be
denied. Reed (2004) reported that Hispanics as a group have the lowest levels of
educational achievement and also the highest poverty rate; about 25% of all His-
panics live at the poverty level, and for illegal immigrants the number is probably
higher. Meanwhile, as Weir (2002) indicated, the rapid growth of the U.S. popu-
lation has led to an equally rapid increase in competition and sorting, with educa-
tion being the most significant factor in the growing disparity in income that is
turning America into a two-tiered society. Given the important role language
plays in academic success and thus in economic success, we have no choice but
to recognize that students need to expand their repertoire of language skills and
conventions, not reduce them, which necessarily would be the outcome of any
serious effort to enforce the idea that students have a right to their own language.
In the hard realities of the marketplace, students may have this right, just as they
have the right to wear a T-shirt and jeans to an interview for a banking job. But in
exercising this right, they also must be prepared to accept the consequences,
which in both cases would be the same—unemployment.
(^1) The NCTE resolution is in stark contrast to the TESOL (Teachers of English to Speakers of Other
Languages) resolution of 1981: “Whereas speakers of nonstandard English should have the opportunity
to learn standard English and teachers should be aware of the influence on nonstandard English on the ac-
quisition of standard English, and whereas TESOL is a major organization which exerts influence on
English language education throughout the educational community, be it therefore resolved that TESOL
will make every effort to support the appropriate training of teachers of speakers of nonstandard dialects
by disseminating information through its established vehicles.”