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A New Era for Foreign Languages
J. David Edwards, Ph.D.
Executive Director, JNCL/NCLIS
Not since the late fifties and early sixties of the Cold War and the Space Race have languages enjoyed the support and attention that they are currently receiving. Over the last few years, numerous studies, reports, and hearings, have noted our nation’s serious language shortages and called upon the federal government to increase and improve the United States’ language capabilities. For example, last November the prominent Abraham Lincoln Commission released their report, Global Competence and National Needs: One Million Americans Studying Abroad, calling on Congress and the Administration to provide $125 million by 2011 for scholarships and fellowships for one million students to study overseas. In early February, the very influential Committee for Economic Development (CED) released their study, Education for Global Leadership: The Importance of International Studies and Foreign Languages for U.S. Economic and National Security, urging increased investment in international studies and foreign languages. Among their various recommendations was “expanding the training pipeline at every level of education to address the paucity of Americans fluent in foreign languages especially critical, less-commonly taught languages.”
These studies and others, as well as the language community’s own advocacy efforts have helped create public pressure, media attention, and consideration by policy makers that are producing new opportunities and advantages. Recently, attention and concern have given rise to new and increased federal policies and funding for languages and international studies. While this may not yet be the golden age of language study, it is quite evident that the United States has entered a new era with respect to the knowledge of other languages and the understanding of other cultures. It is a new era that is being determined by national security and economic competitiveness, but its most serious impact will be upon education.
One of the most significant of these new policies is the “National Security Language Initiative” (NSLI) launched by the President of the United States speaking at a National Summit of College and University Presidents held at the State Department in early January. The NSLI is a joint effort by the Departments of Defense, State, and Education, as well as the Intelligence Community, which will provide $114 million for languages. This figure is roughly divided into $57 million for ED, $27 million for State, $25 million for DOD, and $5 million in Intelligence.
Specifically, within the Department of Education, despite past opposition to the program, $24 million will be for a “refocused” Foreign Language Assistance Program. Other new or expanded programs will include $24 million for developing a pipeline through Flagship K-16 Language Programs; $5 million will go to develop a Language Teacher Corps; $3 million is to expand teacher-to-teacher language seminars; and $1 million will create a new E-Language Learning Clearinghouse.
While the NSLI has been in the planning stages for well over a year, some of the sponsoring agencies had already undertaken impressive internal efforts and achieved progress toward addressing their language needs and developing their language capabilities with policies of their own. Within the Department of Defense, the National Security Education Program (NSEP) has been providing scholarships and fellowships for study abroad in a nation’s language for almost fifteen years. Within recent years, NSEP has initiated the National Language Flagship Initiative, a K-16 Chinese Language Initiative, and laid the groundwork for the creation of a Civilian Linguistic Reserve Corps (all of which will be expanded under the President’s initiative). The entire Department of Defense will implement a Defense Language Transformation Roadmap that, among other things, increases resources for the Defense Language Institute (DLI), requires officers to learn another language, and identifies DOD’s long and short-term language needs.
About two years ago the Department of State instituted a Language Continuum that requires Foreign Service Officers to know two additional languages and be able to use them. State has increased their support for the Foreign Service Institute (FSI) and Education and Cultural Affairs (ECA). This latter support will continue to increase as part of the NSLI through increases in Gilman Scholarships for needy students to study critical need languages abroad, increases in immersion language study centers overseas, and the creation of new State Department summer immersion study programs.
Some of the changes put forth as part of NSLI will require Congress to authorize new or amended legislation as well as provide the appropriations of funds. The first session of the 109 th Congress considered twenty-six bills dealing with languages and international education. In such an environment, it seems quite likely that there will be considerable legislative support for new and increased programs dealing with languages. In fact, some of the pending legislation such as H.R. 4629, Rep. Rush Holt’s K-16 Critical Foreign Languages Pipeline Act anticipates the President’s Initiative. Other bills such as H.R.115, Holt’s National Security Language Act; S.1089, Senator Akaka’s National Foreign Language Coordination Act; or S. 1117, Senators Lieberman and Alexander’s U.S.-- People’s Republic of China Cultural Engagement Act would go considerably beyond NSLI.
Additionally, Congress still has to reauthorize the Higher Education Act in which Title VI contains $93 million in programs dealing with International Studies and Foreign Language Education. The Senate has passed its version of reauthorization which contains S. 1105, Senators Dodd and Cochran’s International and Foreign Language Studies Act. However, the House of Representatives still has to pass its version and then both houses have to reach agreement. While passage of a final bill in the 109 th Congress is not certain, what is very heartening is that both houses’ bills have provisions beyond Title VI that provide support for financial assistance and loan forgiveness for foreign languages. In short, both the Administration and Congress are providing attention to and support for languages. This is a confluence of interest that has not happened in the last forty years.
Leaving the State Department after the President’s speech, I overheard a college president telling a media interview, “It’s a good beginning.” NSLI is a good beginning. The Lincoln Commission and the CED report are good beginnings. Internal initiatives and changes within federal agencies are good beginnings. Many of the congressional bills and amendments are good beginnings. Taken together, they may be the beginning of a good era for languages in the United States. If this is the case, this beginning is in large part possible because of the unity of the language profession, because of effective and tireless advocacy, and because of the knowledge, expertise, and effectiveness of language professionals. These three factors will be even more important not just in determining how we begin the new language era, but in determining what this era accomplishes.
National Security Language Initiative
On January 5, 2006, President George W. Bush announced a National Security Language Initiative at a U.S. University Presidents Summit on International Education. Below is a Department of Education Fact Sheet on the NSLI. Also included is a link to speeches by President Bush, the First Lady, Secretary Rice, Secretary Spellings and others. Finally, we have included an editorial from yesterday's Washington Post (the initiative has received a great deal of media coverage) which merits our serious consideration.
Office of the Spokesman
Washington , DC
January 5, 2006
Briefing by Dina Powell, Assistant Secretary of State for Education and Cultural Affairs and
Barry Lowenkron, Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor
President Bush today launched the National Security Language Initiative (NSLI), a plan to further strengthen national security and prosperity in the 21st century through education, especially in developing foreign language skills. The NSLI will dramatically increase the number of Americans learning critical need foreign languages such as Arabic, Chinese, Russian, Hindi, Farsi, and others through new and expanded programs from kindergarten through university and into the workforce. The President will request $114 million in FY07 to fund this effort.
An essential component of U.S. national security in the post-9/11 world is the ability to engage foreign governments and peoples, especially in critical regions, to encourage reform, promote understanding, convey respect for other cultures and provide an opportunity to learn more about our country and its citizens. To do this, we must be able to communicate in other languages, a challenge for which we are unprepared.
Deficits in foreign language learning and teaching negatively affect our national security, diplomacy, law enforcement, intelligence communities and cultural understanding. It prevents us from effectively communicating in foreign media environments, hurts counter-terrorism efforts, and hamstrings our capacity to work with people and governments in post-conflict zones and to promote mutual understanding. Our business competitiveness is hampered in making effective contacts and adding new markets overseas.
To address these needs, under the direction of the President, the Secretaries of State, Education and Defense and the Director of National Intelligence have developed a comprehensive national plan to expand U.S. foreign language education beginning in early childhood and continuing throughout formal schooling and into the workforce, with new programs and resources.
The agencies will also seek to partner with institutions of learning, foundations and the private sector to assist in all phases of this initiative, including partnering in the K-16 language studies, and providing job opportunities and incentives for graduates of these programs.
The National Security Language Initiativehas three broad goals:
Expand the number of Americans mastering critical need languages and start at a younger age by:
- Providing $24 million to create incentives to teach and study critical need languages in K-12 by re-focusing the Department of Education’s Foreign Language Assistance Program (FLAP) grants.
- Building continuous programs of study of critical need languages from kindergarten to university through a new $27 million program, which will start in 27 schools in the next year through DOD’s NSEP program and the Department of Education, and will likely expand to additional schools in future years.
- Providing State Department scholarships for summer, academic year/semester study abroad, and short-term opportunities for high school students studying critical need languages to up to 3,000 high school students by summer 2009.
- Expanding the State Department Fulbright Foreign Language Teaching Assistant Program, to allow 300 native speakers of critical need languages to come to the U.S. to teach in U.S. universities and schools in 2006-07.
- Establishing a new component in State’s Teacher Exchange Programs to annually assist 100 U.S. teachers of critical need languages to study abroad.
- Establishing DNI language study "feeder" programs, grants and initiatives with K-16 educational institutions to provide summer student and teacher immersion experiences, academic courses and curricula, and other resources for foreign language education in less commonly taught languages targeting 400 students and 400 teachers in 5 states in 2007 and up to 3,000 students and 3,000 teachers by 2011 in additional states.
Increase the number of advanced-level speakers of foreign languages, with an emphasis on critical needs languages by:
- Expanding the National Flagship Language Initiative to a $13.2 million program aiming to produce 2,000 advanced speakers of Arabic, Chinese, Russian, Persian, Hindi, and Central Asian languages by 2009.
- Increasing to up to 200 by 2008 the annual Gilman scholarships for financially-needy undergraduates to study critical need languages abroad.
- Creating new State Department summer immersion study programs for up to 275 university level students per year in critical need languages.
- Adding overseas language study to 150 U.S. Fulbright student scholarships annually.
- Increasing support for immersion language study centers abroad.
Increase the number of foreign language teachers and the resources for them by:
- Establishing a National Language Service Corps for Americans with proficiencies in critical languages to serve the nation by:
1. Working for the federal government; and/or
2. Serving in a Civilian Linguist Reserve Corps (CLRC); and/or
3. Joining a newly created Language Teacher Corps to teach languages in our nation’s elementary, middle, and high schools.
This program will direct $14 million in FY07 with the goal of having 1,000 volunteers in the CLRC and 1,000 teachers in our schools before the end of the decade.
- Establishing a new $1 million nation-wide distance-education E-Learning Clearinghouse through the Department of Education to deliver foreign language education resources to teachers and students across the country.
- Expand teacher-to-teacher seminars and training through a $3 million Department of Education effort to reach thousands of foreign language teachers in 2007.
2006/12
Released on January 5, 2006
Remarks by Secretary Rice http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2006/58735.htm
Remarks by President Bush http://www.state.gov/r/summit/58734.htm
Briefing on the National Security Language Initiative http://www.state.gov/g/rls/rm/2005/58737.htm
List of Participants in the Presidents Summit http://www.state.gov/r/summit/58668.htm
Learning Languages
Sunday, January 8, 2006; Page B06
WITH A CERTAIN amount of fanfare Thursday, President Bush launched the National Security Language Initiative, designed to expand Americans' knowledge of critical foreign languages such as Arabic, Chinese, Russian, Hindi and Farsi. Before a group of 120 university presidents, he described learning foreign languages as a "kind gesture" toward other cultures, as well as an important facet of American security: "We need intelligence officers who, when somebody says something in Arabic or Farsi or Urdu, knows what they're talking about."
We applaud Mr. Bush's sentiments, though the lateness and modesty of this initiative are perplexing. It has been clear for more than four years, since Sept. 11, 2001, that Americans are horrifically deficient in knowledge about those parts of the world that now most threaten us, as well as about those that may pose important security challenges in the future. Yet the initiative will receive funding only in the 2007 budget -- if, of course, Congress approves. Although the State Department issued a fact sheet describing the new program's impressive goals, department officials conceded that only 15 public schools in this country teach Arabic at the moment. Although 200 million Chinese students study English, there are also only about 2,000 teachers of Chinese in the United States. There's a long way to go.
Department officials also referred to the launch of Sputnik, the first Soviet satellite, whose appearance in the sky inspired national concern about the "knowledge gap" between the United States and the Soviet Union and a new emphasis on science and Russian-language education in this country. Sputnik was launched in 1957. President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed the National Defense Education Act, which funded science education, in 1958. He also set up the National Aeronautics and Space Administration in 1958 -- a year after Sputnik, not four or five. The administration should move as fast as possible to make up for lost time.
AP World Languages Initiative (from Thomas Matts, Director, World Languages Initiative Advanced Placement Program, The College Board)
You are very likely aware that The College Board is purposefully and actively seeking to impact world language studies by expanding its Advanced Placement (AP) offerings to include AP Chinese Language and Culture, AP Italian Language and Culture, AP Japanese Language and Culture, and AP Russian Language and Culture by May of 2007. By developing these new AP Exams for students and the corresponding professional development support for teachers, the College Board is taking the necessary steps towards recognizing and promoting second language study its rightful place of prominence and importance in U.S. schools, given the urgent demands of our global 21st century society. While we will continue to support the acquisition of traditional European languages with our AP French, AP German, AP Latin, and AP Spanish courses, we recognize the need to encourage students to broaden their understanding of and ability to communicate with the citizens of a greater variety of nations abroad.
A Matter of Equity
The College Board is equally committed to equitable access to our AP courses for all students, and to the principle that all students who are willing to accept the challenge of a rigorous academic curriculum should be given consideration for admission to AP courses.1 The Board encourages the elimination of barriers that restrict access to AP courses for students from ethnic, racial, and socioeconomic groups that have been traditionally underrepresented in the AP Program. Schools should make every effort to ensure that their AP classes reflect the diversity of their student population. For the study of world languages, the Equity Policy Statement translates into long-sequences of study.
Because of the time investment necessary to achieve second language proficiency and due to the demonstrated benefits of world language studies, it is imperative that state policy makers consider the addition of formal, sequential instruction of world languages as essential, beginning in the middle school and even sooner, in order to allow equitable access to everyone. While we know that elementary programs are key to developing students’ ability to acquire a second language and to fostering their positive, receptive attitudes about language and culture, without long-sequence language study of five or six years, second language fluency and success on an AP exam in a world language remain possible for only an elite, select group of our student population. Does the required K-12 curriculum in your state include long-sequences of world language study?
Five Years’ Study Significantly Better Than Four on AP Exams
Research data bear out that in order to achieve equity for all students, long sequences of study (greater than four years) in secondary schools are essential to the acquisition of second language proficiency. As part of the 2002 AP French, AP German, and AP Spanish language exams, survey data support a strong connection between the length of study (in years) and students’ scores on the corresponding AP Examination. Students who had studied the language for five years scored significantly higher than those who had studied it for only four (Baum, Bischof, & Luna, 2004).2
Foreign Language Study Translates to Higher SAT Scores
In the College Board’s report, 2004 College Bound Seniors: A Profile of SAT Test Takers, students whose profiles include long-sequences of world language study consistently demonstrate higher scores on both the math and verbal portions of the SAT than do their non-language studying counterparts.3 The gains are incremental; the more years of world language study, the greater the gains on the SAT Test. These data continue to corroborate previous research confirming the correlation of world language study with higher SAT scores.4
We hope you believe, as we do, that it is time for state legislatures to recognize the need to support second language proficiency for every U.S. student. We welcome your questions and extend our appreciation to you for your time and careful consideration of this matter.
With best regards,
Thomas Matts
Director, World Languages Initiative
Advanced Placement Program
The College Board
45 Columbus Avenue
New York, NY 10023
212/373-8727
tmatts@collegeboard.org
Marcia Wilbur
Associate Director
Head, World Languages & Cultures
K-12 Professional Development
The College Board
3700 Crestwood Parkway, Suite 700
Duluth, GA 30096
770/225-4079
mwilbur@collegeboard.org
Notes
1 Visit the College Board’s Equity Policy Statement and additional related information at: http://apcentral.collegeboard.com/article/0,,150-157-0-2200,00.html
2 Baum, D. Bischof, D, & Luna, C. (2004) Before and Beyond the AP Foreign Language Classroom. http://www.collegeboard.com/prod_downloads/apc/ap04_beforeandbeyond.pdf
3 http://www.collegeboard.com/about/news_info/cbsenior/yr2004/reports.html
4 Cooper, T. (1987). Foreign Language Study and SAT-Verbal Scores. The Modern Language Journal, 71(4), 381-387.
North Carolina’s 2005 SAT Scores Increase
North Carolina Department of Public Instruction reports that the state's 2005 average total SAT score increased by four points to 1,010, with participation rising by four points to 74 percent of high school seniors, according to results released August 30, 2005, by The College Board. The nation grew by two points to 1,028. For more information, including district results, please go to the NCDPI Web site at http://www.ncpublicschools.org and look under "News."
Students learn Arabic daily through content-based teaching ( click on the link)
On Expanding Chinese Language Capacity in The United States ( click on the link)
Educating Language Learners
Educational Leadership: December 2004/January 2005
The Complete Curriculum: Ensuring a Place for the Arts and Foreign Languages in America’s Schools NASBE (National Association of State Boards of Education) Policy Update, Vol. 11, No. 9.
Campaign urges America to learn foreign languages -
"Nearly half of Americans say there is "too little" foreign language instruction in the nation's public schools, and 50 percent attribute this to a lack of funding, a Roper Poll has discovered..." To read the article, click on the link.
MLA Language Map (http://www.mla.org/census_main )
The MLA Language Map is intended for use by students, teachers, and anyone interested in learning about the linguistic and cultural composition of the United States. The MLA Language Map uses data from the 2000 United States census to display the locations and numbers of speakers of thirty languages and three groups of less commonly spoken languages in the United States. The census data are based on responses to the question, "Does this person speak a language other than English at home?" The Language Map illustrates the concentration of language speakers in zip codes and counties. The Data Center provides actual numbers and percentages of speakers and includes census data about seven additional groups of languages less commonly spoken in the United States.
World View Spring Seminars: Hispanics/Latinos in the Carolinas and East Asia: Tradition and Transformation
World View, an international program for educators, will offer its spring seminars on “Hispanics/Latinos in the Carolinas” and “East Asia: Tradition and Transformation” on March 21-23, 2006, at the Friday Center in Chapel Hill.
Both seminars include lectures, small group sessions, and classroom application sessions. The Hispanics/Latinos in the Carolinas seminar (March 21-22) will offer opportunities to learn more about Latin America, to explore critical issues affecting the lives and education of Latino students, and to become aware of the resources and model programs to help Latino students succeed in school. A participant from each registering school will receive a CD on teaching Latino students and a pamphlet for Latino parents.
“East Asia: Tradition and Transformation” will explore the history, culture, and politics of China, Japan, and Korea with leading scholars from Duke, NC State, and UNC-Chapel Hill. General sessions will address key issues of this vital region’s past and present and concurrent sessions will equip educators to bring East Asia into the classroom. There will be a special session for interested Middle and High Schools to establish a sister school relationship with a Chinese school.
Participants may register online at http://www.unc.edu/world/regform.shtml For more information, contact Laurie Costanza at (919) 962-9264.
New GLOBAL MUSIC Program
In collaboration with the UNC Area Studies Centers, WXYC is launching a new monthly radio program. The program focuses on a particular world region each month, integrating both music from this part of the world and relevant expertise of university faculty. Each broadcast will be a live lesson interspersing music with dialogue. The first Global Music is airing soon and will feature Sufi music and culture, with Carl Ernst as guest. Professor Ernst is the Director of the Carolina Center for the Study of the Middle East and Muslim Civilizations, and a William R. Kenan Professor in the Department of Religious Studies. The radio program will also be simulcast via the web at http://www.wxyc.org/ For more information on the Global Music program and schedule, and the Carolina Center for the Study of the Middle East and Muslim Civilizations, please visit the WXYC homepage at www.wxyc.org. WXYC-Chapel Hill 89.3 FM UNC Student Radio Archived Articles
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