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When Sirad Ahmed came to America, she knew only one word of English: hi. Now, she has been here five years and has studied the language, and she is gearing up to take the test to become a citizen.
But Ahmed, a native of Somalia who plans to apply to take the test next week, is concerned that proposed changes to the citizenship test could make it more challenging.
"I’m OK speaking, but reading and writing, it bothers me," said Ahmed, 46, of the North Side.
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services is revamping the test to include questions that would require answers that show the applicant understands American civics and history and hasn’t just memorized dates and facts.
But advocates for immigrants worry that it will be more a test of their comprehension of English.
The draft with 144 questions was released last week. From those questions, 100 will be chosen for the civics section of the new test. Examiners will choose 10 to ask each immigrant orally, six must be answered correctly to pass.
Sample questions and answers are available to help immigrants study.
"We’re not looking for exact reciting of the answers we provide with the questions. We’re looking for understanding," said Shawn Saucier, an Citizenship and Immigration Services spokesman.
But the reworked questions will be more difficult for immigrants, said Mussa Farah, president of Horn of Africa, a central Ohio organization that holds English and test-preparation classes for immigrants.
"The people I work with are very concerned," he said. "They are learning basic English, and this will be something that will be hard for them."
Instead of writing simple sentences, as in the current test, immigrants will be given vocabulary words to study and asked to write a sentence using those words under the new test, Saucier said.
Experts who teach English as a second language helped create the questions, Saucier said.
Citizenship and Immigration Services does not want to increase the test-failure rate. Now, 84 percent of applicants pass on their first attempt and 95 percent on their second attempt, Saucier said.
In Ohio 10,751 people became citizens in 2005 after taking the current test, according to federal data.
Because the test will ask for more-interpretive answers, it probably will be challenging, said Jill Kramer, who teaches an English class to about 100 immigrants at the Columbus Literacy Council.
"It will cause hurdles for people with very low education or no education in their own language," she said. "Increasingly, our adult immigrants coming in have less education than in the past. When you have no education or literacy in your own language, it’s a huge hurdle to learn to read and write in English."
Ahmed has been enrolled in an English class at the Columbus Literacy Council for a year. She did not attend school in Somalia because she lived in a rural area and her parents couldn’t afford to send her.
However, grasping the language in just one year was not difficult for Ahmed because she already was fluent in Somali, Arabic and Amharic, a Semitic language spoken in Ethiopia.
She is committed to becoming a citizen, she said. "It’s my country, a free country, and I want to be a part of that."
Ahmed won’t be affected by the new test if she passes the current one. But people who apply this time next year probably will take the new test, Saucier said.
Filash Tsemrekla, 56, came to this country four years ago from Ethiopia. She has been in an English class at the Columbus Literacy Council nearly a year and a half.
Tsemrekla, whose native language is Amharic, said sample questions from the old test appear to be easy.
But after looking at the new sample questions she is worried because she is struggling with English. She hopes to take the test in the next few years.
"I’m afraid," said Tsemrekla, who lives in Victorian Village. "If I practice, practice, practice, I’ll be all right."
Source: Columbus Dispatch, Dec 03, 2006