Reply to What do you think about a Japanese Immersion Public Charter in Ward 7?

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Reply to "What do you think about a Japanese Immersion Public Charter in Ward 7?"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]My take on the language choice of Japanese is that there are  no schools or classes, public or private, offered within DC's boundaries geared toward elementary school aged children.   Japanese would be another language choice for DC parents. Also, there are kids classes, schools, and programs in DC for all the languages mentioned in this thread geared toward the non-native speaker. If a parent wanted their children to learn Arabic, Chinese, French, or Spanish in DC, there are options.  I cannot speak about the number of available seats at the Hebrew school. Maybe there are other issues at play. I think Japanese and Korean are interesting language choices to introduce to DC parents. By the way, Japanese is identified as a Critical Needs language. [/quote]

That's great that you feel that way, and if you're passionate about the idea you should go for it.

What most of us are saying though is that if you actually want the school to be full of students and to last longer than a year, you need to be crystal clear about what the demand for the language you're proposing looks like in DC and whether you have any evidence at all that a sizeable number of families would be interested in such a school.

If you replace the word "Japanese" with the word "Norwegian" everywhere in your post, everything you say about Norwegian is true too: are there elementary Norwegian resources in DC?  No.  Are there people who think Norwegian is an interesting language choice?  I'm sure there are.  But does that mean that if you opened a Norwegian bilingual school in DC enough parents would be interested year after year to get enough students in to keep it open?  No, there is no evidence that a Norwegian school is sustainable.  Same for Japanese, and you already have wise people who sound like if anyone would be interested they would, weighing in on this thread and saying no, they would not be.

Follow your dream, I mean that sincerely.  Just be realistic about what to expect.  Don't be surprised as the Sela founders seem to be that there is not enough demand to sustain the school.[/quote]

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