Dr. Patricia Velasco

Esteem Journal / January 19, 2014

Dr. Patricia Velasco began her professional career as aspeech pathologist in Mexico City. After finishing herEd. D. at Harvard Graduate School of Education in theUnited States, she went back to Mexico to establishCasa de la Ciencia to work with indigenous bilingualchildren and their teachers in San Cristobal de lasCasas in Chiapas. Upon returning to New York City,she first worked for the Reading and Writing Project atTeachers College, Columbia University, supportingteachers with the literacy and language needs ofEnglish language learners. Additionally, she was part ofthe faculty at Teachers College in the Bilingual andBicultural Education Program. Presently, she is anAssistant Professor of Education at Queens College,City University of New York, where she coordinates theBilingual Program, and the director of the BilingualCommon Core Initiative (BCCI), a project launched bythe New York State Department of Education todevelop scaffolds and descriptors to support teachersin developing new and home language in bilingualstudents. In conversation here with Estrella Olivares-Orellana, who worked with Dr. Velasco asone of the writers of the project, she discusses her career path, her work with the bilingualcommon core initiative and the importance of effective bilingual education programs.

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Estrella Olivares-Orellana

I understand you started your professional career as a speech pathologist in Mexico City. Didyou grow up in Mexico? Why were you interested in speech pathology?

Patricia Velasco

Yes, I grew up in Mexico. I really wanted to get into the field of education. I have a cousin whois in the field of speech pathology and the wonderful thing about speech pathology is that itcovers many different aspects. You need to know about education, language, testing, parentalengagement, etc. and at the age of seventeen, which is the age, in Mexico, at which youdecide what you want to study, that seemed to be an area that offered many possibilities.Furthermore, the program I went into was not just in speech pathology, it was actually forhearing-impaired children, speech pathology, and for children with reading and writingdifficulties. It provided a broad education in those areas for the first two years, and in your thirdyear you would decide an area in which you wanted to specialize. I became a teacher ofhearing-impaired children.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

I see, so your interest in education was always there. How did you go from that career path toan interest in bilingual education and to pursuing a doctorate degree in education?

Patricia Velasco

I then went to get my masters degree at McGill. I was still very much interested in the educationof hearing-impaired children. I had been a teacher of hearing-impaired children for many yearseven while getting my masters. I actually went into bilingual education through my doctorateprogram, that’s when it actually happened.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

Tell me a little bit about Casa de la Ciencia in Mexico. How did you start that?

Patricia Velasco

I think I have to go over the political environment at the time. This was in the South of Mexico,Chiapas, in 1994 during the Zapatista uprising. This movement brought forward what we hadalways known, which was that the whole country faced inequalities. Something that alwaysexisted but was seldom confronted was that indigenous people faced many inequalities. Anopportunity presented itself because out of the many governors that took over the ruling ofChiapas at the time, there was actually one governor who had federal and financial supportand his backing coincided with that of other research institutions that wanted to createsomething that went a step above just research and toward something more educational forchildren and teachers. I shared this idea with a friend of mine, and we happen to come acrossa house that was unclaimed at the time. We asked the government for the house in order to

create Casa de la Ciencia, and they not only gave it to us but also decided to remodel it.Subsequently to obtaining the house, we created a curriculum for Casa de la Ciencia. Onefascinating aspect that had a great impact on me at the time was reading the book “TheMuseum Experience”, which explained that museums had to change their perspective on howto deal with knowledge. They had to outreach to people and create opportunities for those whowere far away and provide them with access to that knowledge. In our case, the knowledgewas science-based. We then asked from $250,000 from the Kellogg foundation. We wereoriginally going to have two of what we called “camiones de la ciencia” in San Cristobal, but wewere able to have four. These “camiones” were intended to reach the indigenous communitiesthat were too far away to bring the children to the city, San Cristobal. We had manymicroscopes we had received from the German government, those were everyone’s delight; wehad a telescope and a portable planetarium; and in addition to all of that, there was a literacycomponent accompanying the scientific knowledge.

The partnership was with Pronatura, which is an ecological institution based in Chiapas, andthen there were El Colegio de la Frontera Sur, a research institution, and El Consejo Nacionalde Ciencia y Tecnologia, which offers scholarships for students going abroad from Mexico andis also very influential in issues dealing with science education in Mexico. Children areinterested in science because of its hands-on nature; we took advantage of that and centeredour curriculum on using the scientific method for discovering knowledge.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

As a bilingual person, what was your experience with bilingual education? Do you feel that youare what some people call a “balanced bilingual”?

Patricia Velasco

Not really. I don’t necessarily feel that I am a balanced bilingual, if there is such a thing. Ifollowed a very regular path. I was brought up in Mexico. I was sent to a bilingual school; I waswhat Baker would call a sequential bilingual because I started at the age of five. But I was reallyimmersed in a Spanish-speaking environment. I was only taught English at school. I doremember many things about learning English though. I was recently telling Ofelia Garcia that Iremember how important context was for me, when learning new words in English. Every time Ilearned a new word, I always remembered the context in which I learned that word becausethat helped me remember its meaning. I am actually now working on a small scale withcognates. Cognates are generally taught in a decontextualized manner, often given as a list ofwords. Furthermore, there is always this fear of false cognates when teaching a new language.I have been working with some colleagues with English/Spanish cognates in something called“Juego de Palabras”, which kids seem to love. For example, a student created one recentlyand said, “can you really rest when doing a resta (subtraction)?”, or another one was withlexical homographs, for example the words once and once (eleven), which are spelled thesame but have different meaning, we worked with a vignette that said something like:

Ms. Morales has a dog named Sputnik. Sputnik was very depressed and she decided to take

him to the veterinarian. The veterinarian gave him pills and wrote: Take once a day. Ms. Moralesread it as take “once”(eleven) a day. How do you think Sputnik felt?

The understanding of translanguaging is really trying to bring this to the forefront of languagelearning, the fact that you can play with these cognates and lexical homographs and falsecognates because they bring metalinguistic awareness to this kind of analysis of words.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

I like that. I am sure that emergent bilinguals find those exercises humorous. I agree thatcontext is important when acquiring an additional language. How does your bilingualeducation upbringing in Mexico compare to what takes place in bilingual education classroomshere in the U.S.?

Patricia Velasco

My experience with bilingual education was old-fashioned. What we have here in the U.S. is alot of dynamic bilingualism, or bilingualism as a first language. I am currently working with astudent who is a Chinese speaker. Her family is Chinese. She married a Korean person. Theyhave a six-month-old baby. The language of the couple is English but she speaks Chinese. Hedoesn’t speak Korean very well but his mother takes care of the baby when they are not there.So the child is exposed to English, Chinese, and Korean. So what is really the mother tonguethere? There is no such thing. That is why there is a change in terminology occurring, such asthe use of the term ‘home language’ for example, because we often cannot determine if thereis only one language working as a primary language, and the reality is that the language a childdominates today can change tomorrow.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

When I started my studies at Teachers College, I recall you were there working in the Bilingualand Bicultural Education program, which at the time was part of the International andTranscultural Studies Department. I recall meeting you briefly but I think that was the year youleft Teachers College. Currently you are at Queens College coordinating the Bilingual EducationProgram, what has your experience been like, working with bilingual education teachers in NewYork City?

Patricia Velasco

I think New York City bilingual teachers are entirely committed. There was a change betweenthe population of teachers at Teachers College and the population of teachers at QueensCollege. The teachers at Queens College do want to be public school teachers. What I do findis that, in both environments, there is a political commitment needed of bilingual teachers, inthe sense of educational politics, and in the sense of seeing education as something that canchange society. That is why I love to work with teachers. Because in spite of all the negativitythat teachers and many of us in the field of education are getting, you find that there is a new

generation of teachers impervious to that.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

Presently, you are the director of the Bilingual Common Core Initiative, a project launched bythe New York State Department of Education to develop new English as a Second Languageand Native Language Arts Standards aligned to the Common Core Standards, which is howwe met. How did you get involved with this project?

Patricia Velasco

I got involved in the Bilingual Common Core Initiative at the request of the state, ArlenBenjamin-Gomez contacted me and explained the nature of the project and the potentialimpact it could have on education. It has been a year already since I got involved.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

As part of this initiative, the team has developed New Language Arts Progressions and HomeLanguage Arts Progressions for every New York State Common Core Learning Standard inevery grade. Theoretically speaking, the bilingual common core initiative is grounded upon thebelief that language is a social practice, rather than a list of words and grammatical guidelinesthat must be followed, how do you think these progressions will help teachers set upenvironments for this socialization process?

Patricia Velasco

The Bilingual Common Core Initiative had a steering committee at the regional level. People likeOfelia García, the representatives from the Regional Bilingual Education Network, Nelly Mulkay,Terri Brady-Méndez, etc. were all involved. There was also a national advisory board, whichconsisted of people who are prominent figures in bilingual education, such as Jim Cummins,Kenji Hakuta, Guadalupe Valdes, etc. so this means that the bilingual common core initiativewas informed by many people who thought carefully about this. Therefore, the first thing thatwe must stress is that this initiative brought to the forefront all the main ideas aboutbilingualism, such as using the new terminology, the idea of new language versus secondlanguage. Home language versus first language, etc. Secondly, New York is moving fromrecognizing four levels of language proficiency to five levels. Mainly because there is recentresearch supporting that teachers tend to focus more on emerging students or beginnerstudents, but we have to be cautious about the students in the middle ranges, those who needto develop academic language. Another aspect being stressed is that of translanguaging,which is embedded in the templates. If possible after the first stages have been reached, weencourage teachers and teaching environments that allow for students to use both languages. We have to be careful about something though; many teachers feel that just because they goto another language in their lesson that is good bilingual education. However, the purpose ofallowing translanguaging within bilingual education settings is that it permits you to raise thelevel of difficulty of the work and of what you are teaching. It’s not just a question of allowing

the other language to enter in, or to open the spaces for the two languages to exist; it is moreabout education and using the language(s) a student has in order to access the complexities orthe cognitive demands of the curriculum. I don’t know if I am explaining it clearly.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

I understand. I am wondering if what you are cautioning against are some of the examplesused in the successful campaign against bilingual education that Ron Unz ran in California andthat culminated with the passing of Proposition 227, and then later Proposition 203 in Arizonaand Question 2 in Massachusetts. A strong case was made against bilingual education, usingexamples such as what you are warning against, in which students in the middle ranges, whomay have acquired a second language may not be able to demonstrate academic potentialwith that second language, or make academic progress with either language for that matter.Would you say that this bilingual common core initiative is perhaps allowing for progress to bemade in those areas?

Patricia Velasco

I think so. But I also think that because this is a new concept that is being introduced into thefield of bilingual education, we have to be very specific about the purpose of translanguaging inbilingual education settings. In terms of the propositions you mentioned, take the case ofMassachusetts for example, Question 2 passed at a time very close to the events that tookplace on September 11 of 2001. There was a feeling of fear of immigrants at the time.Interestingly, we have to acknowledge that although New York was the place that suffered themost loss as a result of the September 11 attack, it is a state that did not react in that matter. Ithink it is something to be commended for.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

I agree. I was impressed by the tone and language used in the campaign for Question 2 inMassachusetts. However, I think in California, the case presented against bilingual educationwas different. It had more to do with the failure of existing bilingual education programs ratherthan with fear of immigrants; perhaps it was a strategic move to persuade voters.

Patricia Velasco

Yes. But if you analyze the way Ron Unz was running his campaign you would learn that it wasbased on personal anecdotes. He constantly talked about his grandmother, etc. Nonetheless,somehow California has enough loopholes that actually allow the implementation of bilingualeducation in many settings. I don’t know how they actually do it but they manage it (laughter).There are many groups in California that have strived for bilingual education and havedemonstrated that this “English for the Children” movement has not really worked. There needsto be flexibility.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

Yes, and speaking in terms of education policy, bilingual students face many challengesespecially in this accountability driven education system, where even emergent bilinguals inhigh school are expected to take and succeed in standardized exams, such as the Englishlanguage Arts (ELA) regents exam in New York in addition to the NYSESLAT.

Patricia Velasco

Yes. Actually, one of the consequences of the Bilingual Common Core Initiative is that it doesn’tonly provide scaffolds for teachers on how to access the common core standards but it willalso inform the new NYSESLAT. It obviously needs a big change from the four to the five levelsof proficiency, and to really be more careful about testing language and not content, which hasbeen mixed. That has always been a challenge, especially in terms of the conceptualization ofbilingualism. When are you really testing content and when are you really testing language?

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

Right. Assessments need to evolve as well. The ELA exam actually keeps many adolescentemergent bilinguals from graduating in New York State because of the way it is structured. Ithink its modification should also be considered along with that of the NYSESLAT.

Patricia Velasco

Yes, that is a great idea. Now that you mention it, perhaps it will spark some initiative (laughter).The NYSESLAT is being reviewed. Another result of this Bilingual Common Core Initiative is thatnow Colorado and New Mexico are also going to be implementing the home languageprogressions.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

These same progressions being developed in New York?

Patricia Velasco

Yes.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

That is wonderful.

Patricia Velasco

I also want to say Estrella, because you were part of this, and I will try not to get too emotional,that the development of these progressions lasted six months and those were six very intensemonths, as you know, but it was really meant to be. You guys are really wonderful teachers.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

I really admire you. You are such an amazing individual and a very hard working person. It wasreally a pleasure to be part of this project. I have expressed this to you before, and I haveshared with many people, that while I was part of this initiative I learned extensively about thecommon core standards, given that parts of it were new to me, but the most important thing Ilearned was your level of collegiality and respect for those working with you and for you. Thatwas actually one of the most important things I took away from that work.

Patricia Velasco

(laughter) No, I think all the stars coincided. We had this wonderful constellation of teachers.We thought it would be difficult because people were brought together from so many differentparts of New York. But everyone ended up working so nicely together. It was inspiring.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

Certainly. I think all of us learned from one another. I most definitely enjoyed working closelywith Barbara Johnson, the lead editor of the initiative; she is such a wonderful and caringindividual.

Patricia Velasco

Yes, it was a great group of people. This kind of work was needed in order to provide theteachers with the necessary scaffolds. Another piece to this project will be to offer theinformation for the NYSESLAT, and the third part will be developing curriculum, which will bedone in Spanish, Chinese, and hopefully in other languages as well. Those are our next steps,in which we hope to get you involved (laughter).

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

(laughter)

Patricia Velasco

The curriculum aspect will be more like units of study that can reflect the progressionsdeveloped as part of the initial portion of the project and that are around topics that cover thesame areas of knowledge delineated by the state but we don’t really have to use the exactsame topics that have been created by New York State. This offers us a wonderful opportunityto create a curriculum with which teachers can work flexibly feeling supported by the state.They will not be perfect because nothing is perfect. We all have to become tolerant andrecognize that we have state backing and we are going through an important period of time.We have to make the most of it.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

I think that it will be very important work and hopefully the alignment of more appropriateassessments will follow, in order to make education equitable for all students, especially for

bilingual students.

Patricia Velasco

Exactly. Another thing that may happen, because of this, is the creation of a Spanish test.Therefore, there will be real language art assessments that are bilingual in nature. However,when it comes to testing, I really hope things begin to change. The underlying basis behindassessments is a lack of trust, from the government to the teachers, from the teachers to thegovernment, and to society. Hopefully, we can move to a better place because I really believethat when it comes to assessments, we are in a bad position. There is an overkill ofassessments and it actually stems from a lack of trust and a lack of dialogue.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

I agree and I would add that when it comes to teacher training and the common corestandards, perhaps assessments have been implemented prematurely.

Patricia Velasco

That is the culture of mistrust I was referring to. We really need to strive to move to a betterplace

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

Yes, and for bilingual teachers in particular, there are extra factors that must be considered andthat are sometimes overlooked, such as the understanding that students are dealing withlanguage acquisition in addition to content acquisition.

Patricia Velasco

Right.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

What advise would you give to prospective bilingual teachers?

Patricia Velasco

I think that if you know two languages and you have not gone for your bilingual certification,you should. Additionally, what we are all trying to do is to create positive environments forbilingual teachers and bilingual students, so I would say that the work of advocacy goes handin hand with being a bilingual teacher. There is a sense of trust that bilingual students andfamilies place on the education system, and we need to strengthen and foster thoserelationships.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

I know that you have been tremendously immersed in this initiative since it began about a yearago and it is near its end. What’s next for you, post bilingual common core work?

Patricia Velasco

Well, the fun part for me was working with all of you in the creation of the progressions. Sincethen, it has been the revising of all the templates, etc. Hopefully, the revision aspect willculminate in February. We are now trying to prepare a set of documents to be sent to thenational advisory group to get their feedback and be able to post them for teachers. Theteachers that have already accessed some samples through the engage New York websitehave said that they find them very useful, in particular the fact that the translanguagingstatements are there. They find the linguistic demands very helpful as well. We have learnedthat the part that requires the most work is twofold. First, there is the deconstruction of thestandard. Secondly, understanding the scaffolding. Consequently, we have been working onsimplifying the templates and we should be able to post them soon. You are correct in sayingthat I have been completely immersed in this initiative.

The first article on the common core initiative is coming out in 2014 in A Handbook toImplement Educational programs, Practices and Policies for English Language Learners. It isbeing edited by Liliana Minaya Rowe. That is where we are now. There has been a great dealof staff development and there is still need for more and at some point we need to move on todeveloping teacher preparation material. But the next step will be curriculum writing and thatwill be the fun part. One of the people that will be consulted for this is Catherine Snow. She hasan effective word generation program for students, which has a Spanish component. We wantto base our curriculum on oral language development, discussions being a big part of it. Wealso want to include topics topics that are relevant to the Spanish speaking population. Forexample, in terms of science we would like to include information about scientists and rolemodels that are representative of our Spanish-speaking students. Guillermo GonzálezCamarena, for example, was a Mexican engineer who invented the first color television. We feelthat students would appreciate to see role models that come from their countries.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

Yes, that is very important.

Patricia Velasco

We must not forget that bilingual education is about educating students. The purpose ofproviding a space where translanguaging can occur freely is to allow access to rich content.Bilingual education is not to water down curriculum or to provide direct translations. Allstudents deserve to be challenged and we must have high expectations and provide access todifficult concepts in order for students to be able to succeed. That is what we are trying toaccomplish with this initiative.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

Estrella Olivares-Orellana

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I look forward to the next phase of the bilingual common core initiative. The need for effectiveprofessional development and appropriate curriculum to implement the bilingual common corestandards is imminent. This conversation has been a pleasure. You are somebody that I admiregreatly. I feel extremely fortunate to have been able to work with you and hope to be able tocontinue to do it in the future.

Estrella Olivares-Orellana (contributing editor) is a doctoral candidatein Curriculum and Teaching at Teachers College, Columbia University.Her scholarly interests are in the areas of bilingual and biculturaleducation, science education in bilingual settings and the academicexperiences of immigrant students. Presently, she is conductingqualitative research with students who have been classified aspresenting interrupted formal education. She is also a part-timeinstructor in the department of Arts & Humanities at Teachers Collegeand a full-time bilingual science teacher at a high school in the suburbsof New York. Estrella holds an Ed.M. in International EducationalDevelopment from Teachers College and a B.S. in Biochemistry fromSUNY, Stony Brook. She is a native of Chile but lived many years inArgentina before migrating to the U.S. in 1994.

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January 19, 2014 in Interview. Tags: Bilingual Education, Common Core, New York City, Teachers

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