Two Filipino lawmakers press for enhanced use of English

MANILA, December 28, 2010—With the growing demand in the competitive global environment, Visayan lawmakers have pushed for a more enhanced and strengthened use of the English language as medium of instruction in all schools.

In separate bills, Cebu Reps. Eduardo Gullas and Rachel Marguerite B. Del Mar and Bacolod Rep. Anthony Golez Jr. called for the immediate passage of their measure that seeks the continued and persistent use of English in all levels of education.

Gullas filed House Bill 93 along with Golez as co-author. Del Mar, meanwhile, filed a similar measure, HB 191.

During the 14th Congress, HB 93 was approved by the Committee of Higher Education at the Lower Chamber. In the case of the Del Mar bill, it was passed on third and final reading in the House of Representatives during the 13th and 14th Congresses but did not get Senate approval for lack of time before Congress adjourned.

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Early enrollment in January set for school year 2011 – 2012

MANILA, December 27, 2010 (PNA)—The Department of Education (DepEd) set an early schedule of enrollment for school year 2011-2012 this January as part of its intensified efforts to achieve the 2015 Millennium Development Goal (MDG) targets.

The DepEd urged students and parents to take advantage of the pre-registration undertaking of the department and enroll before the May to June enrollment rush.

“One of the greatest challenges DepEd faces is convincing parents to bring their children to schools, to keep them there and finish basic education,” the DepEd said in a statement. “Since Christmas break gives families a time to bond, we encourage our present students to convince their parents to enroll their younger siblings who are already of school age during the pre-registration period set by the department early next year.”

The DepEd added that this move is among the efforts of the department to ensure that it remains on the right track in hitting the Millennium Development Goal (Goal) targets and the Education For All (EFA) commitment as the 2015 deadline comes closer.

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Stock market subjects to be integrated into Philippine high school curriculum

MANILA, December 12, 2010 (PNA)—Officials of the Philippine Stock Exchange, Inc. (PSE) and the Department of Education (DepEd) announced that they have successfully completed their nationwide validation activities for the integration of stock market subjects into the high school curriculum.

The validation activities are also aimed at assessing the effectiveness of the stock market module to be included in an official lesson guide for high school teachers.

The PSE and DepEd conducted series of roadshows in key cities all over the Philippines, covering close to 700 students and 40 members of the academe from six private and national public high schools.

“These activities form part of the PSE-DepEd module development project that will integrate stock market topics in the high school economics curriculum, which will be ready for implementation come school year 2011-2012,” PSE president and chief executive officer Val Antonio B. Suarez said.

In November 2009, pilot testing sessions were conducted at Rizal High School in Pasig City, the country’s largest secondary school in terms of student population. This year, the second wave of validation sessions were carried out in the cities of Cebu and Davao from Nov. 8 to 12.

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Php5.57B released in additional holiday perks for teachers

MANILA, December 17, 2010 (PNA)—The Department of Budget and Management (DBM) has released to the Department of Education (DepEd) a total of P5.57 billion for the full P10,000-Performance Enhancement Incentive (PEI) of 556,971 DepEd school teachers, principals and employees.

DBM Secretary Florencio B. Abad also announced that by Friday, Dec. 17, the DBM would have fully released the total P8-billion national government counterpart in the PEI for 1.16 million national government employees.

“This time around, our teachers will receive their PEI within the holiday season; unlike in the past when they received it late, like sometime before summer. We acknowledge DepEd for their work in ensuring the timely release of our teachers’ PEI,” he said.

DBM officials coordinated with their DepEd counterparts so that both agencies could simultaneously process their shares in PEI. Of the total, P5.57 billion released to DepEd, P3.90 billion comes from the national government’s savings for the P7,000 share, and P1.67 billion comes from DepEd’s savings for the remaining P3,000.

Abad noted that of the national government counterpart in PEI for its employees, almost 49 percent of the P8-billion total amount is for DepEd’s teaching and non-teaching personnel.

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“School on air” launched in Muslim Mindanao

COTABATO CITY (December 9, 2010)—The Department of Education in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao has ventured into a mass media strategy to provide functional literacy courses to out-of-school children in the far-flung areas.

Ustadz Nur Pulong, Director, Alternative Learning System, DepEd ARMM said that radio station DXED with a power of 99.7 khz was funded by the Australian Agency for International Development (AUSAID) to the tune of Php 1.5 million.

This is part of the Basic Education Assistance to Mindanao (BEAM), a project supported by the Australian government towards the promotion of education in this part of the country. BEAM also assisted DepEd ARMM in the processing of permits and licenses to operate the radio station from the National Telecommunications Office.

A tieup with the Philippine Broadcasting Service (PBS) has accorded the radio station access to programs and other educational services of the government.

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Filipinos sue California hospital over English-only rule

LOS ANGELES, December 7—Dozens of Filipino hospital workers in California sued their employer Tuesday alleging they were the sole ethnic group targeted by a rule requiring them to speak only English.

The group of 52 nurses and medical staff filed a complaint accusing Delano Regional Medical Center of banning them from speaking Tagalog and other Filipino languages while letting other workers speak Spanish and Hindi.

The plaintiffs are seeking to join an August complaint filed by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in Kern County federal court over the hospital’s enforcement of a rule requiring workers to speak English.

Filipino workers said they were called to a special meeting in August 2006 where they were warned not to speak Tagalog and told surveillance cameras would be installed, if necessary, to monitor them. Since then, workers said they were told on a daily basis by fellow staffers to speak only English, even on breaks.

“I felt like people were always watching us,” said tearful 56-year-old Elnora Cayme, who worked for the hospital from 1980 to 2008. “Even when we spoke English ... people would come and approach us and tell us, ‘English only.’”

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China bars English words

December 27, 2010—Chinese newspapers, books and websites will no longer be allowed to use English words and phrases, the country's publishing body has announced, saying the "purity" of the Chinese language is in peril.

The General Administration of Press and Publication (GAPP), which announced the new rule on Monday, said the increasing use of English words and abbreviations in Chinese texts had caused confusion and was a means of "abusing the language."

Such practices "severely damaged the standard and purity of the Chinese language and disrupted the harmonious and healthy language and cultural environment, causing negative social impacts," the body said on its website.

"It is banned to mix at will foreign language phrases such as English words or abbreviations with Chinese publications, creating words of vague meaning that are not exactly Chinese or of any foreign language," it said.

"Publishing houses and the media must further strengthen the regulated use of foreign languages and respect the structure, glossary and grammar of the Chinese and foreign languages."

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Government to heed concerns on the use of English

MACAU, December 30, 2010—Legal Reform Office director Chu Lam Lam promised it will “take into consideration” foreign investor’s concerns over the lack of information available in English language.

“We know there are already many foreign investors operating in Macau,” she told Macau Daily Times. “Some laws, including a few on investment, are already translated [into English], while others are not,” the official added.

For instance, the Government Printing Bureau released an English-translation of Macau’s Trade Code in 2003. The Basic Law, banking and insurance supervision laws and intellectual property legislation – currently being revised – have also been translated into English.
However, as University of Macau professor Jorge Godinho stressed in an article published by Macau Business, all these translations are unofficial and suffer from “a clear lack of consistency in legal terminology”, which means investors still need professional legal advice.

Last August the British Consul General to Hong Kong and Macau, Andrew Seaton, told MDTimes the main concern of British companies operating in the territory is the use of English language in a territory where Cantonese and Portuguese are the official languages.

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English is vital for an international city, English professor says

December 20, 2010—While Chinese and Portuguese remain as Macau’s official languages, the importance of using English has gained greater significance since the handover, particularly with the liberalization of the gaming industry and with the plan to transform the SAR into an international tourist destination.

But for that to be successfully accomplished, more effort should be put in place to better promote the English language across the city, said Glenn Henry Timmermans, associate professor from the English Department of the University of Macau.

“Given that English is the ‘lingua franca’, I think that if tourism is the focus when we speak of diversification, then English is vital,” he said.

“As a tourist when you go to a new country one thing that crosses your mind is: ‘Am I going to be understood?’ Tourists always look for a certain level of ease when travelling,” the scholar said on last weekend’s TDM Talk Show. Nonetheless, he added, “The English language actually has a very long history in Macau”.

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Surge in demand for TEFL courses

December 28, 2010—There has been a surge in demand for courses offering English-language teaching qualifications, with record numbers of people leaving Ireland to seek jobs in education abroad.

Waterford-based “voluntourism” specialist i-to-i said the demand for TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) courses had increased 30 per cent as a result of excessive demand for college places and a lack of jobs.

Ian O’Sullivan, manager of i-to-i Ireland said the company had seen a surge of people undertaking TEFL courses in the last year, adding: “We can’t keep up with demand”.

He said a growing number of graduates were looking overseas for work, discouraged by a tight job market as unemployment rates continue to soar, adding that even long-time workers who have recently been made redundant are opting for teaching jobs abroad, 20,000 of which are advertised each month.

“We’re getting people of all ages coming to us for internships, paid jobs abroad and volunteering work. Previously we dealt with students, now it’s everyone.”

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UBA rekindles reading culture with “Read Africa” project

December 26, 2010—Concerned by the dwindling reading habits among youths in Africa especially in secondary schools, United Bank forAfrica (UBA) plc, the pan African banking group has introduced the“Read Africa Project”, an initiative to rekindle reading culture amongAfrican students in post primary institutions.

The Read Africa Project is packaged by UBA Foundation, the corporate social responsibility arm of the bank, as part of its interventions in promoting education, learning and development. The project, “Read Africa”, initiative will involve the provision of recommended English language and English literature text books for students in some junior and senior secondary schools across Africa.

Mr. Kennedy Uzoka, Executive Director, Resources UBA Plc said that the Read Africa project is formulated to encourage learning through reading. “A lot of young people these days are more comfortable with digital devices than reading and this is manifesting in the quality of education.
UBA recognizes the need to improve learning, imagination and knowledge through reading and this initiative is one of our areas of intervention in the sector” he said.

Mr. Uzoka said that the exercise which began early in December 2010 will run till the end of first quarter, 2011…

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Master English, but speak your mother tongue, says convention organizer

MANGALORE, December 19, 2010—Curtains came down on the 25-day long first World Konkani Cultural Convention organized by Mandd Sobhann on Sunday with senior BJP leader L K Advani exhorting the Konkani speaking community to be proud of their mother tongue and its rich culture. The former deputy PM at the same time exhorted people at large to master and love English language (Angrezi) but not be slave to English mentality (Angreziyath).

Presiding over the valedictory function, Advani, referring to distinct opposition among the political class to use of English vis-a-vis Hindi, said it is not proper to hate English language, but one should be wary of surrendering to English mentality. India will emerge, as the largest English speaking population in the world and it is imperative that people have mastery over English, but at the same time maintain love for their mother tongue.

Referring to his own childhood, which was spent in Karachi of Sindh province in current Pakistan, Advani said he was conversant with only English and Sindhi, his mother tongue when he turned 20. “People are surprised when I tell them that I learnt Hindi after that and I read my Ramayan and Mahabharat, first in Sindhi, then went on to read the same in English, and at much later date in Hindi,” he said much to the delight of the gathering.

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The rat race called “speak in English”
By Meghnad Sahasrabhojanee, Times of India

December 12, 2010—The face of the English language is changing fast. It's the most popular language throughout the world. Realising its importance, 'spoken English' classes have mushroomed in different parts of the city. Learning English is no more an option. It's a necessity to survive and succeed in the cut-throat competitive world. People from non-English backgrounds find the language a big stumbling block. Experts feel it's basically due to low confidence levels.

Corporate trainer Raveena Khan says,"People who come from non-English backgrounds find it very difficult to adjust in an environment where people converse in the language fluently. This makes them lose confidence and their mistakes increase. When you are frightened of something, you tend to avoid it. With motivation and training, they can overcome their fear and learn the language."

Motivational speaker and personality development expert Suresh Chari feels that learning more languages has its advantages. “I was in Japan for a few days. To move around, I had to learn Japanese," he says. "For me, it was a fun thing to do. Any language is good...”

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Marathi or nothing, says consumer commission
        
December 1, 2010—While Marathi has long been used at the consumer court, a judgment by the State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission on Monday has now made it the only acceptable language for seeking even the most basic “daad,” or relief.

Ruling that any papers submitted in English would be rejected outright, the Commission said that those who did not understand Marathi should get their affidavits translated.

“The forums have been constituted for redressal of grievances of the consumers in Maharashtra. Their pay, salaries, and allowances have been paid out of fund of the state government. If the law requires things to be done in a particular manner, then it should be done in that manner only,” the Commission said.

The matter came to the court after a dispute between Atul Tawade, an employee of the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC), and Goregaon’s Sindhur Housing Society over the use of English in a reply filed before the consumer forum. While Tawade contended that all papers should be in Marathi, the society said that since he understood English, there was no reason for them to translate their response.

The forum, in January, rejected Tawade’s plea saying that he was an educated diploma holder who was conversant in English...

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100 teachers refused to be redeployed to districts

KUALA LUMPUR, December 16, 2010 (Bernama)—Some 100 teachers involved in a redeployment exercise have refused to be transferred to other districts in Selangor.

National Union of Teaching Profession (NUTP) president Hashim Adnan said the 84 English Language and 16 Malay Language optional teachers were redeployed under the programme to strengthen Bahasa Malaysia and English 2009-2010.

“Mismatch of teachers was among factors that gave rise to this problem. Transfer of teachers will cause more problems rather than solve existing ones,” he told a press conference at Wisma NUTP here Thursday.

Hashim said the ministry should consider factors like age, health and family when considering appeals from the 100 teachers redeployed.

Meanwhile, NUTP secretary Lok Yim Pheng said the transfer of teachers to districts involves high transportation cost.

“They have to leave their families and only get to meet them on weekends, thus creating problems. Transfer on short notice is inhuman.”

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Language drive may harm science standards
 
HO CHI MIN CITY, December 21, 2010—Representatives from schools for the gifted are concerned that they will not be able to properly teach mathematics and computers in the English language in the 2011-2012 school year, according to the Ministry of Education and Training.

Under the new programme, all schools for the gifted must use English to teach a number of subjects by 2020.

Maths and computers must be taught in English for the 2011-12 academic year and other subjects, including physics, chemistry and biology by 2020.

Deputy Minister of Education and Training Nguyen Vinh Hien said that most students could not speak and write English fluently and that even the English level of students who have attended the international science Olympiads was low.

Their communications skills are poor, and scores on reading tests low.

Nguyen Hai Chau, head of the ministry's high school development programme, added that Viet Nam's many excellent students could not get scholarships abroad because of their poor English skills.

Using English as the language of instruction will improve their skills and allow them to compete in international and regional competitions, he said.

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Not exactly coveted: the Plain English Campaign’s Golden Bull Award
 
November 11, 2010—NHS Lanarkshire beat Fife Council to the “prize” of a Golden Bull for a lapse into management speak that left the English language in a critical condition.

The sentence “These are cascaded to senior staff across the organisation through to frontline staff via a structured mechanism to facilitate ownership of data” was described as “baffling” by judges at Friday’s awards ceremony in Manchester.

A spokeswoman for NHS Lanarkshire said, “We accept that the extract which has won an award this year does not meet our own high standards for publicly available information.

“We are responsible for issuing a huge volume of public and patient information via our website and through patient information leaflets. We try to check all information prior to publication.

“This is a valuable reminder that it is easy to slip into jargon and that we need to make sure all the information we publish is clear and concise.”

The Plain English Campaign hands out Golden Bulls each year for the worst crimes against the English language.

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Foreign Office second language is gibberish, says Plain English Campaign

December 10, 2010—The internal advert for a “Reputation Manager” was criticized for being full of jargon and using almost indecipherable phrases.

Part of the advertisement’s original text said the role required: “Maintenance and development of the UK narrative around FCO and its value proposition, using insights from research and evaluation as well as knowledge of the evolving FCO strategy to inform resonant messaging.”

The FCO conceded the statement “did not meet” clear communication standards expected of senior government officials.

It said the “plain English translation” should have been: “Work out better ways of telling people what the Foreign and Commonwealth Office does.”

It was one of several examples awarded “Golden Bull” gongs by the Plain English Campaign at a ceremony in Manchester on Friday.

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London mayor shamed over poor use of English

November 11, 2010—London Mayor Boris Johnson has been named and shamed for his poor use of the English language.

Football pundit Jamie Redknapp was also among the award “winners” in the Plain English Campaign’s annual Golden Bull booby prize to mark National Plain English Day.

The Golden Bull awards recognize the year’s most baffling examples of gobbledygook.

Politician Mr. Johnson, a former newspaper editor, was nominated for a comment in a Transport for London press release where he called for London to become
“A cyclised city.”

Other Golden Bull winners include NHS Lanarkshire for a staff document which used the sentence: “These are cascaded to senior staff across the organisation through to frontline staff via a structured mechanism to facilitate ownership of data.”

The language was labeled “baffling” by the Plain English Campaign, which held the awards ceremony in Manchester.

Former Liverpool and England player Redknapp was named the Foot in Mouth Award winner for his incorrect use of the word “literally” and other gaffes. Examples included: “These balls now—they literally explode off your feet.”

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UK schools fall in global ranking

December 7, 2010—Secondary school pupils in the UK are falling behind their international counterparts, according to a major survey from the OECD.

Pupils have slipped down a global league table in reading, maths and science, based on two-hour tests taken in 65 school systems around the world.

Finland and South Korea, as last time, achieved the best results.

Education Secretary Michael Gove said the survey showed the “urgent need to reform our school system.”

Within the UK, Wales performed significantly less well than England, Scotland and Northern Ireland in all three subjects.

The latest findings of the PISA survey—the Programme for International Student Assessment—show the UK tumbling down the rankings, according to the results of tests taken last year by an international sample of 15-year-olds.

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OIRA and the English Language

November 28, 2010—Write for your audience. Keep sentences short and simple. Use the active voice and avoid the passive. Short words are better than long ones, and don’t turn a noun into a verb (personal worst example ever encountered: “enterprising the network”).

No, these are not tips from a high school composition class, but reminders for civil servants on how to write from the Plain Language Action and Information Network (PLAIN), newly designated by the Office of Management and Budget as the official interagency working group for the promotion of readability.

Cass Sunstein, administrator for OMB's office of information and regulatory affairs, appointed the group to be the language minders of the federal government in a Nov. 22 memo that’s a result of President Obama signing into law on Oct. 13 the Plain Writing Act of 2010.

The act requires that by Oct. 13, 2011, documents necessary for obtaining any federal benefit or service and documents for filing taxes—those which provide information about benefits or services or how to comply with federal regulations—be written in plain language. That means, Sunstein wrote, concise and simple writing that avoids jargon, redundancy, ambiguity and obscurity.

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Boston schools to expand vacation classes to hone English, math skills

November 23, 2010—Boston Public Schools will increase efforts to bolster student proficiency in English and math next year by adding six schools to a program that teaches extra classes over February and April vacations.

In 2011, the number of schools participating in the Acceleration Academies program will increase from nine to 15, Matthew Wilder, school district spokesman, said today.

Last February, week-long workshops matched about 100 teachers with more than 1,200 students from grades three through eight, focusing on English Language Arts. In April, the students received math instruction, according to the school district.

In a statement today, the district said the program has already seen positive results, boasting a 20 point gain in Student Growth Percentile in English and a 17 point gain in math among participating students. SGP measures students' improvement by comparing their MCAS results from one year to the next.

“These results prove that for our most vulnerable students, additional time with a great teacher can make a huge difference,” Superintendent Carol Johnson said in the statement.

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Court: Defendants with limited English have right to interpreter
 
ATLANTA, November 22, 2010 (CNN)—Defendants with limited English-language skills have a constitutional right to court interpreters in criminal trials, the Supreme Court of Georgia ruled Monday.

The ruling came in a case involving a Mandarin Chinese speaker who was sentenced to 10 years in prison on two counts of cruelty to a child. Annie Ling, who had limited English language skills, did not understand that she had the option to plead guilty instead of going to trial and possibly facing a longer sentence, said the American Civil Liberties Union, one of two groups that filed a friend-of-the-court brief stating that denying a defendant an interpreter violates the U.S. Constitution and civil rights laws.

“The court acknowledged that we don’t have two systems of justice in this country—one  for English speakers and another for everyone else,” said Azadeh Shahshahani, director of the National Security/Immigrants’ Rights Project at the ACLU of Georgia. “The constitutional guarantee of due process applies to everyone in this country, not just fluent English speakers.”

Ling was arrested and charged with two counts of cruelty to a child. Her children were removed from the home and placed in foster care, according to court documents. After a 2008 trial, Ling was convicted of one count of cruelty to a child, and sentenced to 15 years, with 10 to serve in prison. The conviction was appealed to the Georgia Supreme Court.

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