The philosophy of Santa Ana Unified School District is to value, promote, and develop biliteracy and biculturalism through its Dual Language Immersion and World Language Programs in Elementary, Intermediate, and High schools. As part of this process, during the next few years, the district will increase the number of schools that offer world languages in their curricula, knowing that learners with a rigorous language instruction in addition to English will be clearly prepared for our global economic growth and competitiveness.   

The district will also strongly support the provision for parent choice to enroll their children in a school that offers these bilingual programs or world language classes. The development of skills in two or more languages helps students facing the personal and professional challenges of our 21st century global multicultural multilingual world. The benefits are enormous for the students who become biliterate and cross-cultural competent, as well as for the community and the country, that will be economically and socially more cohesive and will provide more quality of life and services to its citizens.    

Some of those benefits can be summarized as follows: Intellectually, the students who speak, read, and write in more than one language develop a more cognitive flexibility, working memory, and problem solving abilities at the same time that increase their academic performance on achievement tests. Socially, being bilingual offers the students the opportunity to develop knowledge, tolerance and respect, and appreciation for other cultures. It also facilitates their heritage cultural pride and a stronger family connection and social integration. Economically, the knowledge of cultures and languages in a global market extends the possibilities for employment, carriers, and better salaries all around the world.