National Association of Bilingual Education-WINNER OF MIDDLE SCHOOL WRITING CONTEST!!!!!

Congratulations! I am pleased to inform you that your student, Luis Angel Albiter, was selected as the NABE Essay Winner for the middle school division. You will receive a formal letter from the NABE office in the near future. I will need the parent contact information (email and phone number) in order to arrange the transportation to Las Vegas, NV. Sincerely, Orlando Chavez Student Essay Committee Chair The Importance of Being Bilingual Luis Albiter October 10,2014 Being bilingual is not just about getting a better job or having an advantage over monolingual speakers but much more. For instance, being bilingual gives you the advantage of having a diverse background and culture. Having diverse cultures gives you the advantage of living two different lives. Not only do you have a diverse background but you can revel in the many celebrations you can now enjoy when being bicultural. It can also be very rewarding emotionally because if you see a hispanic woman being spoken to by an English speaking person, and the woman does not know English you can help her and when you're done you feel good and accomplished. Not everyone gets the chance to be bilingual and have the opportunity that some of us have. In every generation a seed is planted and it is our job as the bilingual speakers to nurture it so the next generation can do the same. Many bilingual speakers speak two languages but they don't realize what they have or they lose that advantage in life. Not only that but when you hear people talking to their peers in a language you had a chance to learn you feel left out and lonely. Scientists have proven that bilingual speakers have a different way of solving problems. For the test they sat a monolingual speaker and a bilingual speaker, side by side. As it turned out the bilingual speaker finished first and had a more developed way of solving the problems than the monolingual. Bilingual speakers benefit academically in many ways because they are able to switch between the two spoken languages and think more flexibly to solve problems. For years bilingual studies have grown and even monolingual parents have enrolled their children into bilingual studying for the same reasons, getting a better job, a brighter future and learning a different language. In conclusion, we learned that being bilingual is very important. You should also consider learning another language it will take you far in life. --