Families and students in southern Wisconsin are celebrating after the Delavan-Darien School District school board voted to keep its K-12 dual language program unchanged following weeks of community pushback and organizing efforts.
The district had considered shortening the Spanish-English dual-language program so it would end after sixth grade, citing staff shortages and financial constraints. But after packed meetings, petitions and public comment, the Delavan-Darien Board of Education voted to maintain the program in its current 4K-12 grade structure for the 2026-2027 school year.
“This victory belongs to every person who showed up, spoke up, shared information, signed the petition, attended meetings, contacted board members, created signs, supported students, and advocated for bilingual education,” according to a comment from a petition which was circulated mid-April to protect the dual language program.
Board members also voted to create an 18 person Dual Language Advisory Committee and strengthened the dual language coordinator position.
The advisory committee will include teachers, parents, community members and administrators who have applied for consideration. According to the Gazettextra, the committee was created in response to findings from the community needs assessment.
“[The community] identified a need for a clearer shared vision, more consistent implementation across schools, stronger communication with stakeholders, increased support for bilingualism, and improved use of data to monitor program effectiveness,” the publication reported.
The committee is expected to provide recommendations on the future of the program, instructional practices, equity and access, communication strategies and additional improvements.
According to the district’s website, the Delavan-Darien School District is the only school district in Walworth County to offer a Spanish/English dual language education program.
The program was designed to support bilingual learners while also giving English-speaking students the opportunity to become biliterate in Spanish and English.
According to the district’s website, the two-way instructional model allows native English speakers and native Spanish speakers to learn together through multicultural and multilingual instruction.
The dual language program began in 2014, and starts in 4K. Its classes are made up of half English speakers and half Spanish speakers, and 90% of the instruction is in Spanish for fourth grade and half in English and half in Spanish in 5th grade.
According to the Gazetteextra, the school district told them that more than 600 of Delevan-Darien’s 1,700 students are enrolled in dual-language education. In addition, 52% of the Delavan-Darien student body is Hispanic.
According to a December 2025 report from the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction titled “Status of Bilingual-Bicultural Education Programs in Wisconsin,” 55,772 English learner students were enrolled in Wisconsin public and independent charter schools during the 2024-25 school year, accounting for about 7% of the state’s student population.
The report found English learner enrollment increased from 49,528 students during the 2020-21 school year to 55,772 students during the 2024-25 school year.
According to the DPI report, the Delavan-Darien School District has approximately 300 eligible English learner students, with wages and other bilingual education costs totaling more than $1.58 million. State reimbursement for the program totaled about $128,819.
A Wisconsin school board votes to keep dual language program after pushback from families, students was first published by Wisconsin Latino News and republished with permission.
Angeles Ponpa is the Managing Editor of Latino News Network Midwest, overseeing Illinois Latino News, Wisconsin Latino News, and Michigan Latino News. She is based in Illinois.
U.S. President Donald Trump boards Air Force One on August 14, 2026 at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland. Trump is traveling to Long Island to tour law enforcement facilities in Nassau County and rally support for local Republican candidates ahead of the upcoming midterm elections
Travel Far Enough, You Meet Yourself
Is it possible that our President has simply not traveled enough?
Born and raised in Queens and attending Fordham University in the Bronx, Donald Trump has no record of traveling outside New York until he was over 20, when he transferred to a college in the neighboring state of Pennsylvania. Were his formative years amiss, then, in his learning about other places and other people?
Is his view akin to the famous New Yorker cover by Saul Steinberg, an illustration of the United States with New York City as the epicenter of the country and the Hudson River the border of the known world? We can now at least add Washington, D.C., and Mar-a-Lago to the map of “the realm.”
Our President has now traveled some, but what we recommend is another kind of travel. Not a state-sponsored trip or a venture to scout locations for future Trump Towers. This would be a genuine travel experience, enriching and eye-opening, showcasing other cultures and ways of living.
It will extend far beyond viewing military parades, hobnobbing with such “understanding” world leaders as Kim Jong Un, or taking tea with the King.
WHERE, then, should the President go? As Elon Musk’s Starship spacecraft is not yet ready to take passengers to Mars, perhaps he could explore our own vast country?
Maybe he could travel to “flyover country,” the farming states, where his ying-yanging tariffs and trade restrictions have played havoc with rural economies. Or possibly to California, number one in homeless U. S. citizens, and while there, regale homeless veterans (approximately 32,500 nationwide) with tales of his brave exploits invading and bombing foreign countries.
Or he might tour the Great Lakes, and rename the other four?
WHEN should he go? This will be tough, as he is very busy building his ballroom and renaming bodies of water.
How about a trip in early November, around the midterm elections? Despite the long-discredited accusation of widespread voter fraud, it would be reassuring to know he might be so caught up divvying out ladles of soup in a soup kitchen somewhere that he wouldn’t remember to deploy the military for “election security.”
HOW will he travel? He should definitely not take his Qatari-donated, newly renovated 747, especially after last time, when he had to be smuggled off clandestinely in a catering truck. It’s unlikely any traveling companions, like the Secretary of State or of the Treasury, are going to fall for the ruse a second time. Besides, we may need those people. No more decoys!
Perhaps the President could fly commercially, although this likely would expose him to undue suffering. Without gold bathroom fixtures and maple wood floors, the trip will be no “Luxury Experience.” If only he still had his “Trump Shuttle,” bought with a massive loan he later defaulted on, saying then, “I’m smart. I got out at a good time.”
Considering the potential pitfalls, maybe it’s best the President travel incognito, disguised perhaps as an elderly woman wearing a lot of bronzer.
Wherever, whenever, however: our President needs a vacation.
Moreover, we need a vacation from him.
If the President refuses our travel suggestions, here’s another idea:
Let’s get him a pet! He has never owned a pet. As we know with our children, pets teach essential life lessons: compassion and empathy; they instill a sense of responsibility. There is a well-established connection between those who can care for a pet and those who can care for people.
So, which pet should we choose? A puppy? A kitten? A boa constrictor?
Imagine, the President may even decide he likes having a pet. After all, what is more obedient than a well-trained dog, besides possibly the Cabinet? And what is more docile than a sweet kitten, other than plausibly the Supreme Court?
The President may even become more mellow with a pet afoot and less likely to slap tariffs on our allies, or attempt to annex our neighbors, or bully our Congress. (Realizing, of course, a bully requires active participation from the bullied to maintain his status.)
Maybe we should do both: get the President a pet and devise a travel plan for him. (Do you think we could possibly convince him to leave his phone at home?)
Let’s go for it! After all:
Travel far enough, you meet yourself. (David Mitchell)
And for our President, that would likely be the most profound discovery of all.
Amy Lockard is an Iowa resident who regularly contributes to regional newspapers and periodicals. She is working on the second of a four-book fictional series based on Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice."