[Prudence]

First of all, I disagree with the classification of Ebonics as a different language. It's been a few years since I took a linguistics course, but at that time Ebonics was classified as a dialect. The classification of a language pattern as dialect or language is largely political.

This brings me to a quandry -- on the one hand, it hardly seems reasonable to hold special classes in a dialect. Imagine a Maine dialect immersion course! On the other hand, no one tells students they shouldn't communicate in their southern dialect at school.

Still, with a dialect there's an assumption that one is capable of communicating in and understanding "standard" Language X. What comes to mind at the moment are UK dialects. Although I think this might have changed, at least at one time you could be from Northumbria, but if you want to be in broadcasting you'd better learn BBC English.

Now, if it's meant to be strictly supplemental -- such as reading some literary texts in dialect as part of a cultural enrichment program -- then I'd have no trouble with it, as long as it didn't dominate the curriculum. For example, I'm sure it was "instructive" for me to have read Faulkner in high school (painful though it was), but that was as part of a broad sampling of US literature. If it had been all Faulkner, all the time, I can't imagine that would have been helpful.

I would be curious to know the current state of linguistic affairs in the UK. In the USA, I'm curious to know how Creole is accommodated (or not), as that's the nearest analogue I can think of.