[EDLING:2440] US Education Dept. needs Foreign-Language Czar

[Francis M Hult]

Via lgpolicy...
> 
> http://chronicle.com/daily/2007/03/2007032801n.htm
> 
> Wednesday, March 28, 2007
> 
> Education Dept. Should Have High-Ranking Official to Oversee
> Foreign-Language Study, Report Says
> 
> By SIERRA MILLMAN
> 
> The U.S. Department of Education needs a high-ranking official to oversee
> its efforts to dramatically expand Americans' proficiency in foreign
> languages and knowledge of international affairs, according to a report
> released on Tuesday by the National Academies' National Research Council.
> The report was prepared by a committee convened to review the "adequacy
> and effectiveness" of the programs, which are supported under two federal
> laws -- Title VI of the Higher Education Act and the Fulbright-Hays Act.
> It generally defended the programs, and their long-term and broad-based
> approaches to training people highly skilled in foreign languages and with
> expertise on other cultures. But it also called for more support for their
> projects, which include university-based National Resource Centers and
> Language Resource Centers, saying those programs should not have to
> compete with or conform to more narrowly focused critical-language
> initiatives shaped by current foreign-policy goals.
> 
> "You don't know what the critical language is going to be 20 years from
> now, and you need a reservoir," Kenneth Prewitt, a member of the review
> committee, said at a briefing on the report, "International Education and
> Foreign Languages: Keys to Securing America's Future." Mr. Prewitt, who is
> a professor of public affairs at Columbia University, said that reservoir
> includes the academic centers supported by Title VI.  Between 2001 and
> 2003, the centers offered instruction in 276 less-commonly-taught
> languages. By contrast, the Defense Language Institute and the Foreign
> Service Institute offered instruction in only 74 of those languages,
> according to the report. The committee found that the Title VI and
> Fulbright-Hays programs at once directly support the study of foreign
> languages and international affairs, and encourage universities to expand
> those efforts, said Janet L. Norwood, committee chair and a counselor and
> senior fellow with the Conference Board, a nonprofit business-research
> organization in New York.
> 
> The committee, however, could not compile enough reliable, standardized
> data to determine exactly how effective the programs were and how well
> participants were learning. Limited oral examinations and self-assessments
> are the most common methods in place, and both are "inadequate," said
> Michael C. Lemmon, another committee member and a professor of strategic
> planning at the National War College of the National Defense University.
> Even more seriously, the financial support for both the Title VI and
> Fulbright-Hays programs has not kept up with the accelerating pace of the
> mission they were expected to fulfill, Ms. Norwood said. While
> appropriations for Title VI programs spiked after the terrorist attacks of
> September 2001, they have declined in the last few years, and support for
> Fulbright-Hays programs has similarly dipped, according to the report.
> 
> Although universities have been successful in leveraging minimal resources
> toward maximum gain, the committee agreed, they need a voice in Washington
> to advocate for them. This national language czar should be a
> Senate-confirmed, executive-level bureaucrat, someone with "clout" in the
> Department of Education who reports directly to the secretary on whether
> the nation's efforts in international and foreign-language studies are in
> step with its needs. The official should also be an academic, said Karin
> C. Ryding, president of the American Association of Teachers of Arabic and
> a professor of Arabic at Georgetown University. "I think most academics
> would be anxious to have someone with an academic background and a
> background in language teaching and linguistics," she said in a telephone
> interview. That person would be best equipped to understand the challenges
> that professionals in the field confront daily, explained Ms. Ryding, who
> was not on the committee.
> 
> Assessment, she agreed, is a problem. When it comes to Arabic, "there are
> just not enough proficiency testers," she said. "There's maybe 20 or 25 in
> the whole nation who are certified, and they are constantly in demand."
> The report recommended that more research be done as to how technology can
> help to improve assessment and build a common educational platform for use
> across languages, Mr. Lemmon said. Committee members agreed that despite
> uneven progress, a sea change had occurred, one that will not soon be
> reversed. The launch of the Sputnik, the first artificial satellite, by
> the Soviet Union in 1957 led to more Americans studying Russian. Interest
> in Japanese and other East Asian languages grew with the strength of
> Japan's economy in the 1980s. Now Americans studying foreign languages are
> increasingly immersed in Chinese or Arabic.  "We've now had enough
> shocks," Mr. Prewitt said, underscoring the committee's overall optimism.
> "We're never going back to a place where we can simply tend our own
> garden."
> 
> http://chronicle.com/daily/2007/03/2007032801n.htm