The Bilingual Revolution

Programs in the American School System
The Bilingual Revolution, the Story of a Grassroots Movement that Emerged in New York
The book The Bilingual Revolution: The Future of Education is in Two Languages tells the story of a grassroots movement that emerged out of the dedicated involvement of motivated parents, educators, and community actors willing to create and support dual language programs in New York City public schools.
Combining insight on learning and living in two languages, the book shares practical applications and examples of bilingual education, from preschool to high school. With New York City as a backdrop, Fabrice Jaumont, from a personal and scholarly perspective, recognizes in his book the successes and setbacks of these programs through vignettes that feature the parents and educators he helped initiate bilingual programs in their schools.
Although the roots of bilingual education in the United States can be traced back to the early 17th century, Jaumont describes a new phenomenon sweeping the country with the objectives of:

Embracing families’ and communities’ own unique cultures and promoting their linguistic heritages as important parts of the greater international mosaic of our society
Helping facilitate community re-engage with public schools
Promoting a social, economic, and cultural sense of community and helping to bridge gaps that continue to divide us

Nicknamed the “godfather of language immersion programs” by the New York Times, Fabrice Jaumont has more than 25 years of experience in international education and the development of multilingual programs in the United States. In spearheading what he calls the “Bilingual Revolution,” Jaumont has put his expertise at the service of the French, Italian, Japanese, German, and Russian communities by helping them to develop quality dual language programs in their local public schools. He is himself the father of two bilingual and bicultural girls who attend a public dual language school in Brooklyn.
A true believer in the benefits of bilingualism –from improved critical thinking to a profound sensitivity toward other people and cultures–, Jaumont depicts and encourages the development of bilingual programs. It is his belief that these offerings can positively transform and empower children, schools, and communities in unprecedented ways. In the diversity of the stories he shares, Jaumont paints a picture of a viable 21st-century solution to preserve linguistic heritage and raise a generation of young bilingual, bi-literate, multicultural citizens of the world.
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About the Author
Fabrice Jaumont is Education Attaché for the Embassy of France to the United States, Program Director for FACE Foundation in New York, and Research Fellow at Fondation Maison des Sciences de l’Homme in Paris. 
Fabrice Jaumont has successfully designed and developed a broad range of educational programs in the United States, advocating to and engaging with communities to develop advanced dual bilingual programs in American schools. He was nicknamed the “Godfather of Language immersion programs” by the New York Times in 2014.
In recognition of his work in the areas of bilingual and multilingual education, Jaumont received a Knightship in the National Order of Academic Palms from the Government of France in 2012, the Medal of Reconnaissance from the American Committee of French-Speaking Societies in 2015, and the Francophone Award of the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie in 2016.
Jaumont is the author of Unequal Partners: American Foundations and Higher Education Development in Africa(Palgrave-MacMillan, 2016) which focuses on the role of philanthropy in education, and on the influence of American foundations over universities in the developing world. Vartan Gregorian, President of Carnegie Corporation of New York, wrote the book’s foreword.

About the moderator

Jean Charconnet is currently Attaché for Education at the French consulate in San Francisco. Before coming to California, he was an Associate professor at Paris 8 University, Teaching in the Master of languages didactics. 
The subjects of his courses focuses on language policies and IT for language teaching. He is a member of the research laboratory CNRS UMR 7023, Formal Structures of Language, where he gave a presentation this year on the plasticity of reasoning, which summarized his work on analogy (Charconnet, 2003, Analogie et logique naturelle, Peter Lang, Berne) , in relation with the other canonical forms of reasoning . He also made a presentation last year at the Sorbonne on the linguistic education policy and the reform of education in Vanuatu, as he has a fair amount of experience abroad in the management of educational and cooperation projects, having worked from 2013 to 2014 as Regional Project Coordinator,in the Asia-Pacific Office of 'Agence Universitaire de la Francophonie', from 2009-2013 as Attaché for Education at the French Embassy in Port Vila, Vanuatu, and from 2006 to 2009 as Cooperation Attaché for French language at the French Embassy in Bangkok, Thailand.