Reply to Yu Ying - Transferring to Yu Ying from another state

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]

Forgot to say - the first group, the "no new students after 2nd grade until 6th grade" group, feel that way because[b] there is a priority on mantaining the lottery as the only way to enter the school (no testing in, becaue that would give families who can pay for Mandarin classes/tutoring/nannies a huge advantage). [/b] I don't know anyone in that group that doesn't get why it wouldn't be great to be able to have more already bilingual students fill those slots, but it's an equity issue.  But NONE of those people (or people in the "let students test in" group) want to see non-Mandarin speaking students thrown in with Mandarin speaking students in 3rd, 4th or 5th grades.[/quote]

Regarding the statement in bold: It's hardly a "huge advantage" to have the opportunity to enter a school that's PS-6 in 3rd grade, where: (1) seats will only be available if students leave the school; (2) your child must meet some sort of Mandarin proficiency test; and (3) you have to win a lottery among the people who meet #2 in order to get the very very few seats available because of #1. The idea that someone will give their kid 4 or 5 years of tutoring on the off chance they could get into YY for grades 3-6 is crazy.[/quote]

You're either clueless or purposefully being misleading.  Mandarin is the flavor of the month (and is likely to be for years to come), and parents are ALREADY investing in Mandarin language resources for their tiny ones, NOT just on the off-chance they'll get into YY, but because Mandarin is a priority for them and if they don't get into a Mandarin bilingual school, they'll find another way to supplement their kid learning it.  The interest in Mandarin hardly begins and ends with YY.  We were getting ready to send our DC to a Mandarin language school in our last city before getting to DC and arrived here already knowing about YY and hoping to get in.  But regardless of admissions (or not) to YY, Mandarin was and is very important to us.[/quote]

This is true for most parents who choose a Mandarin immersion school at other cities but not as much at Yu Ying simply b/c of the way the lottery is run here and the limited number of seats at desirable schools.  There are many families at Yu Ying who originally sent their kids there b/c it's the best school they got into through the lottery not b/c of their desire for mandarin specifically.  Then there are other families who chose it b/c it's the only Mandarin immersion school in DC.  It makes for a diverse community and those who did not originally chose YY for the Mandarin become more devoted with time or they leave.  Since there is very little attrition, looks like learning Mandarin eventually becomes a priority for those families too.[/quote]

[b]Your scope is too limited.[/b]  You are speaking as if YY is the starting point for many parents.  These days, it's not.  There are a lot of parents committed to Mandarin a language their kids will learn "by any means necessary", having nothing to do with the existence of YY.  There is a reason other DC schools are slowly starting to introduce Mandarin instruction, although not in an immersion way yet.  If a parent is committed to Mandarin and has resources to work with, they will get it for their kid one way or another.  If they get into YY, score, but if not, they are still moving forward.  It's those parents who will have a huge advantage over everyone else (except native speakers) if upper attrition slots get filled during non-lottery years by proficiency test in, and then there will be no slots when it opens up again for 6th.[/quote]

Actually, I don't think so.  People on this forum seems to think learning Mandarin is the equivalent of learning Spanish or any other language.  It isn't.  Weekend classes starting when the kid is young won't do it.  My BFF who is a native speaker in Mandarin has been sending her son to 1x a week classes since he was 4 as well as exclusively speaking to him in Mandarin since he was a baby.  Her words but her 12 yr old son's Mandarin "sucks" if she can get him to speak it at all which she can't.  He always answers back in English.  For Mandarin for young kids, you need an immersion school and the well kept secret is that even Yu Ying has trouble getting their kids to speak Chinese on Chinese days.

I hope someday the policy will change so that kids who are proficient in Mandarin can test-in to YY for 3, 4, 5th grades.  It'll be helpful to the kids who are already there.[/quote]

If it's that difficult to learn, maybe no children should be learning it, outside of those who are exposed to the culture outside of school. Really, this obsession that if my child doesn't learn "Mandarin" they won't be successful in the 21st century is ridiculous. Only time will tell, but perhaps some of these anxious parents are holding their children back by making them struggle with this difficult language in the early years at the detriment of other core subjects. Do the Finns do this, there children are not even in school?[/quote]

The point of my post was that to teach a language to young kids that is not commonly spoken in the US you need an immersion school.  And that in all likelihood, the kids who can test-in to the higher grades like 3, 4, 5 are native speakers from China not the children of kids whose parents are all gung-ho about their kids knowing Mandarin and supplemented with tutors and what-not.[/quote]

You clearly didn't do your research (as you previously stated), we don't have a large population of native Chinese speakers in DC. I really don't know who you are but every time you post your story changes, you are definitely not someone I would trust to open a school your seem to just be jumping on the bandwagon immersion and parents fears that if their little Johnny doesn't get into an immersion Mandarin school. "the sky is falling". Pray tell why should the DC tax payers fund your school?[/quote]

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