TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – Lawmakers will vote next week on a bill that would allow high school students to substitute computer coding classes for foreign language requirements.
For one student, it could mean the difference between college and a technical career.
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Andrew Ladanowski and his son, Jeremy Ladanowski, are walking the halls of the state Capitol on a mission: Pass legislation allowing Jeremy and other high schoolers to take computer coding classes instead of a foreign language.
"It's very important for me and my son because my son has speech apraxia, so he has a difficulty pronouncing words, pronunciations, as well as a learning disability in respect to speech and language," Andrew Ladanowski said.
"It would take me forever to pass a foreign language, pass a foreign language," Jeremy Ladanowski said.
Andrew Ladanowski is worried that if his son is forced to take a foreign language it will detract from his otherwise good grades.
"He won't have the time and energy to excel in the courses that he does. We'd like to maintain those As and Bs in the science, technology and mathematics, and we worry that we spend all the time and resources trying to learn this foreign language that those grades will slip and the opportunity of going to college will be diminished," Andrew Ladanowski said.
The legislation is slated for a vote by the full Senate next week. Some educators are pushing back.
Opponents argue that while computer coding may be useful, it doesn't use the same brain activity as learning a foreign language.
"There's a lot of critical thinking that goes into it," Sen. Jeremy Ring said. "It is a global language."
"Maybe an IT person," said Jeremy Ladanowski, envisioning what he may do. "Something to do with computer science."
While they push computer coding, Jeremy is also getting an education in Lawmaking 101.