[KS] Claire Lilenthal Alternative School

[Frank Hoffmann]

Peter, since you mention Europe ... there are a couple of high 
schools (Gymnasium) in Germany that teach Korean, e.g. the 
Herschelschule in Hanover (also teaches Chinese, Greek, etc.) and 
other schools, including elementary schools, in Berlin, one in Trier, 
at least one in Munich, etc. In some of the schools, not just high 
schools, of North Rhine-Westphalia, one of the German states, Korean 
and 15 or so other languages are taught, depending on the needs of 
local immigrant communities -- for obvious reasons there are many 
more schools teaching Turkish or Russian than Korean. Having said 
this, please do not get me wrong: the integration of immigrant 
children, even those 2nd generation children born here, has hardly 
been a topic in German politics. Schools had no policies set up to 
deal with the specific problems of immigrant children. Only now do 
some politicians look over 'the big pond' to realize that maybe the 
U.S. did a better job -- but it still is not exactly one of the top 
10 political topics here. Immigrant communities (those without German 
citizenship) make up 15 to 25% of large cities 
(http://www.k-faktor.com/frankfurt/abb1.htm) and we get to a much 
higher percentage if counting 1st generation immigrants with 
citizenship.

San Francisco, of course, with its 1.3 million Asian-Americans, is 
naturally a little ahead of the game. In the mid-1990s, when they 
started the language programs, there were already around 900 students 
learning Korean in Californian schools (see: 
http://www.stanford.edu/group/CFLP/research/MLJ82/MLJ1.html).

Best,
Frank


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Frank Hoffmann
http://koreaweb.ws