I have absolutely no problem with helping those who are trying to learn English, and who feel more comfortable with Spanish while they are learning. As long as they are trying, that is most commendable. It means they are on their way to being a productive member of American society. And you have to start somewhere, right?
The ones I do have a problem with are the ones that have no intention of learning English, or just "haven't gotten around to it". We make it so easy for them. Many companies, including the one I work for, have people who are bilingual in order to help their Spanish-speaking customers. In some places it's a job requirement. Signs in some supermarkets are in Spanish. Legal documents are in English and Spanish. Phone system messages are available in Spanish. Even ATMs have a Spanish option. It seems that we are catering to these people at every turn. And it doesn't look like we have any intention of stopping.
As long as we continue to offer everything in their native language, where is the motivation for learning the language spoken in this country? What reason will they have for learning to speak English? It's not as though it's inconvenient for them to remain ignorant. In fact, it's probably a lot more convenient for them that they don't learn English. All in the name of cultural diversity, we make every effort to help them along in their native language, perhaps not even realising that we are really hindering them.
Citizenship tests are now offered in Spanish. This is a direct affront to any efforts we have to maintain English as the standard. This is the only country in which citizenship tests are offered in languages other than the standard. If you were to go to, say, France, and try to take the citizenship test in English rather than in French, they wouldn't let you. In fact, I'm fairly sure they'd laugh you right out of the country. So why do we let Hispanics get away with not learning the language spoken in the country they chose to move to?
Bilingual education is perhaps the most unfair practice in schools today. By this, Hispanic children are taught in their own native language. While this makes it easier for them to understand their lessons, it does nothing to help them learn English. All it does is slow them down more. It's a well-known fact that the younger a child is, the easier it is to learn a second language. As a person gets older, it gets harder and harder to pick up a new language. So, the logical thing would be to start early, and teach Hispanic children English from the very beginning. But in many cases, this is not done.
There are, however, schools that do immersion education. By this, Hispanic students are in a class with English-speaking children and everything is done in English. Sometimes, they need things explained again in Spanish, but they get the association with what they know and English, and hear how the language is spoken. When I was a senior in high school, I was a "cadet teacher", sort of a high-school version of a student teacher., and I worked in an English-speaking kindergarten classroom in which there were five or six Hispanic students. When I got there at the beginning of the year, they needed a lot of help. They had to have a lot of things explained to them again in Spanish, and sometimes had to have whole lessons in Spanish. But as the year progressed, they were learning English, and by the end of the year, they needed very little help in Spanish. Immersion education is an excellent way to teach children English, while it is still relatively easy for them to learn.
Unfortunately, not enough schools practice this form of education. And not enough Hispanics are learning English. So now what? We can't continue to cater to them by not requiring them to learn English. And we must not continue to sell their children short by not teaching them English in the schools. They came to this country, we didn't force them here. If they chose to come here, they must learn to speak the language, just as they learned to abide by the laws.