Leaders with vision who act boldly?

Testimony of Dave Porter Before Oregon House Education Committee

3/16/07

Chairman Buckley and member of the Committee, my name is Dave Porter. The following is testimony in support of HR 3, HJR 29 and HB 2763.

The issue is China, and are we preparing today’s students in Oregon for the challenges and opportunities that a rising China will pose over their lifetimes? The answer is: not at all.

            Consider the scale of the challenges: Columnist Thomas Friedman wrote “that when the history of this era is written, the trend that historians will cite as the most significant will not be 9/11 and the
U.S. invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. It will be the rise of China and India.” Columnist Nicholas D. Kristof wrote “I’m a believer in China, and I think it will end this century as the most important country in the world.” Scholar Jeffrey Sachs advised Americans to prepare for a world where by the year 2050 China’s economy could be 75% bigger than our own. China will be the most important, pivotal security relationship for the US in the 21^st century. War, peace, prosperity, pandemics, terrorism, and global warming all turn on US-China relations. What is at stake for us and our children is simply too enormous to continue to avoid.

             Put those thoughts on the future with where Oregon is now: Currently less than 1% of Oregon high schools graduates have had two years or more of  Mandarin. While some expansion is underway, it is unlikely to reach 2% soon. At the university level, less than 2% of the undergraduates at the U of O, OSU and PSU now study Mandarin. During the 2003-04 academic year, only 35 (0.044%) of the 79,558 students in the Oregon University System studied abroad in China. These are not the statistics of an educational system preparing students for the 21^st century or to engage a rising China constructively. We have done little to address the biggest issue of the 21^st century.

             We must begin to change what we are doing. HR 3, HJR 29 and HB 2763 all are positive steps in the direction we need to go. Oregon needs to invest in developing more Mandarin programs for its students K-16, featuring not the two years of high school foreign languages of the past, but more programs that produce fluent speakers able to function professionally in two languages and cultures. Fortunately, we know generally how to do this: start young, immerse the student and spend time in the foreign culture. Oregon has a few public and private language immersion programs that start in kindergarten. The U of O’s Center for Applied Second Language Studies, together with the Portland Public Schools, has had a federal grant to develop a national model for a K-16 Mandarin curriculum. The International School in Portland has produced fifth graders able to pass the Chinese government’s Mandarin exam for admission to Chinese universities. We know what to do K-5 and just need to do more of it. We need further work to find ways to make immersion and heritage programs work in middle school and high schools. We need more entry Mandarin programs after the elementary years. We need distance learning Mandarin programs for students in districts without Mandarin classes. We need to develop teacher exchange programs. And, most important, we need to find ways to send many, many more high school and college students to China to study. So we have much work to do.

             HR 3, HJR 29, and HB 2763 are a good start. We will need to do much more in the future. I dream of an Oregon that does more, an Oregon that sends this message to other states, to China, and to the rest of the world: Oregon understands the challenges of the 21^st century. We may not like them, but we see them clearly and will meet them. And then, I dream further, those future historians of Tom Friedman as they write their histories of this era will note that Oregon had a generation of leaders, writing of us, with vision who acted boldly to provide the tipping point for a century of global peace and prosperity. Our children deserve this from us.

 Thank you for your consideration.

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