President George W. Bush's accomplishments on immigration reform fell well short of the comprehensive plan that he and others envisioned. Yet the Bush administration did more than any other in modern history to lay the groundwork for a much-needed immigrant integration policy. The Obama administration must now use that beginning to build a bolder immigrant integration policy - an immigrant policy that stands alongside our immigration policy.

The federal government hasn't paid much attention to immigrant integration in recent history. Any policies related to immigration have dealt almost exclusively with who should be allowed in, who can stay and who should go. When it comes to integration, the policy has been one of no policy. The closest departures from a federal laissez-faire approach are symbolic gestures, like resolutions affirming the primacy of English and speeches about the importance of becoming American punctuated by fist pounding.

Under Bush's watch, the federal government, through the U.S. Office of Citizenship, started very quietly to do something about immigrant integration. Created when the Department of Homeland Security took over the nation's immigration apparatus in 2003, the Office of Citizenship has helped overhaul the citizenship test, publish preparation materials for the citizenship test in multiple languages, and created a Web site, www.welcometoUSA.gov, that contains information about everything from how to find an English language class to where to volunteer to help immigrants integrate.

But the Office of Citizenship has been working all too quietly. Rather than merely promoting citizenship and American civic identity, the office ought to implement initiatives that foster a form of integration that is mutually beneficial to immigrants and their adoptive country.

The Office of Citizenship should begin by helping immigrants learn English. If there is one thing on which people on all sides of the immigration debate agree, then it is that learning English is highly desirable. Though all evidence points toward high levels of English language acquisition over time, those who can't speak English suffer from diminished earning power, have a tougher time being involved in their children's lives, and can't fully participate in life in the United States. But English language classes are notoriously over-enrolled, and good teachers are hard to come by. The Office of Citizenship ought to make grants available for more classes and teacher training to local government and nongovernmental organizations.

The Office of Citizenship can also help immigrants better use the skills they bring with them. Some have called for an immigration policy that favors the highly skilled, not realizing that we already have a sizable skilled immigrant population. The problem is that these people can't get the kinds of jobs they were trained to do. The Migration Policy Institute's National Center on Immigrant Integration estimates that 1.3 million college-educated immigrants are unemployed or underemployed in jobs like dishwasher, taxi driver and security guard because U.S. employers do not recognize foreign credentials. This tragic waste of skills hurts both immigrants and our economy. The Office of Citizenship can help create a program that translates foreign credentials for employers so that the nation's skilled newcomers fulfill their potential in the labor market.

Finally, far too many immigrants fall prey to scams perpetrated by individuals who promise to expedite their citizenship, find them jobs and help them buy a home. These scams undermine trust between immigrants and American institutions and are corrosive to integration. The Office of Citizenship should develop programs that educate immigrants about their legal rights and the potential threat of scams.

The Office of Citizenship is not a substitute for mechanisms that drive integration, like good schools and anti-discrimination laws. Nor should federally led integration efforts impose an ethnically chauvinistic version of American identity, something that the Office of Citizenship has been careful to avoid. But our nation of immigrants must have a bolder immigrant policy; one that promotes integration not by passively encouraging it, but by providing the tools that foster integration that is good for both immigrants and their new home.