UC LMRI 2001 Conference Highlights

The Fourteenth Annual UC LMRI Conference
held May 4-5 at UCLA's Tom Bradley International Hall in Los Angeles, California

The topic for this year was “Developing (Bi-)-Literacy.” Featured Keynote Speakers were Ron Schmidt and Luis Moll . Approximately 100 attendees enjoyed the two day conference, which included eight sessions, two panels and two keynote addresses. The first keynote speaker, Ron Schmidt of California State University, Long Beach, addressed the topic of “The Politics of Language in the Era of Proposition 227”.

His presentation provided an assessment of the political situation facing proponents of bilingualism and biliteracy in the era of Proposition 227, drawing from and building on the analysis in his book, Language Policy and Identity Politics in the United States (Temple University Press, 2000).

On Saturday afternoon, Luis Moll of the University of Arizona, gave his keynote address topic on “Exploring Biliteracy and Beyond: Developing a Case Example of Educational Sovereignty.”

He presented a summary of an on-going longitudinal study that addresses two goals: (1) the development of biliteracy of a cohort of children with different social class, cultural, and language characteristics, tracing the students' different trajectories as they become literate in Spanish and English; (2) the study of language ideologies, in part, as manifested in adults and children's discourses, and how these ideologies come to mediate the schooling process.

He also discussed how the school represents a case example of “educational sovereignty”, as it collectively manages to provide “additive” schooling in two languages despite political pressures to the contrary.

Other highlights included:
• Several panels on the development of biliteracy
• Presentations by five UC LMRI dissertation grant recipients: Eunai Park (UC Santa Barbara), Robert Ream (UC Santa Barbara), Tom Stritikus (UC Berkeley), Clayton Hurd (UC Santa Cruz), Iliana Reyes (UC Berkeley), and Barbara Conboy (UC San Diego)
• A panel on the impact of Proposition 227
• A panel on the difficulty of acquiring academic English in secondary schools.

Friday, May 4, 2001

Russell Rumberger, Director, UC LMRI, opens the conference

BUFFET LUNCH AND TIME TO MINGLE AND RELAX BETWEEN SESSIONS

...AND DINNER SATURDAY NIGHT...

TO 2001 CONFERENCE PROGRAM (PDF)