Helwing spent her first six summers at Inter-American traveling and studying in Mexico and Spain. Bilingual programs, she said, aim to immerse pupils in English at the expense of their first language. About 65 percent of the school's pupils are Hispanic. About 150 schools nationwide have similar programs, she said. Pupils at Inter-American routinely score above state averages on the Illinois Standards Achievement Test and have some of the highest scores within the Chicago Public Schools.
Success comes with a price, though.
Only about 3 percent of the pupils who apply to Inter-American are accepted. A complex magnet-school formula based on neighborhood residence, race and relationship to current pupils leaves relatively few seats available for other applicants, and those are filled by lottery. Pupils who make the cut, however, are guaranteed to become fluent in two languages by the time they graduate. Adults said this will give them greater job opportunities. The kids, for the most part, hardly notice.