We, the undersigned parents and community members, expect Prince George's County Public Schools to provide Spanish Immersion from pre-kindergarten through the twelfth grade among the choices offered to families beginning in the 2014 - 2015 school year. The choices we seek include proven immersion models for children whose first language is English, Spanish or another language; these include:

- Full and partial immersion models where the approved curriculum is taught in Spanish for all or half of the school day;

- English-Spanish dual language/two-way immersion models with roughly equal groups of native English and Spanish speaking groups of students; and

- International school models that incorporate Spanish Immersion into the curriculum.

Language immersion schools are highly valued and proven to be successful in other communities. Prince George's County Public Schools offers two French Immersion schools for kindergarten through the eighth grade. We believe Spanish Immersion schools will bring significant academic, cross-cultural and economic benefits to Prince George's County, especially considering the increasing population of Spanish speakers in our community, region and country.

Our vision is a Prince George's County that nurtures early development of bilingual or multilingual children who excel academically across subjects, interact effectively with people from different cultures, and compete successfully in the global marketplace. Spanish Immersion choices offered by Prince George's County Public Schools are long overdue and critical to realizing this vision.