Yet to learn English, students need not forget the language they bring to school with them'be it Spanish, Vietnamese, or Urdu. Bilingual education is not like an antibiotic that we give to children who are sick, their illness being lack of English. As soon as the children are well, that is, as soon as they know English, the antibiotic bilingual education is removed. Good bilingual programs are not remedial but enrichment programs. One common misunderstanding is that bilingual education is the exclusive domain of immigrant students.
Languages expand a child's cognitive development.
Knowing more than one language is not an impediment to intellectual capacity. If it were, the rest of the world's children outside of the United States would be intellectually inferior to ours. After all, the majority of them are bilingual. Years ago, being bilingual was a privilege reserved for those who could afford to send their children to private tutors or to a finishing school in Europe. It was a privilege reserved for those who traveled and went to the opera.