Foreign Language requirement revisited

[Mickey Jones]

I have experienced the same bias you expressed at both the collegiate and HS levels. Sam Supalla and I worked some years ago to pass a law to get ASL offered in Illinois for HS foreign language credit. Some HSs offer it in the English department (figure that one out) so the kids won't get F.L. credit. The only group to lobby against the bill was the F.L. Teachers' organization. They saw ASL as a definite threat to their departments.

Instead of the dreaded "P" word, can you make a statement or describe a level of conversational fluency that would make sense to non-FL people? 

Or, state that after two semesters, students have elementary expressive skills, but they really need the third semester to raise receptive skills to the same level.


Mickey Jones, Ph.D.
Director
Evaluation Center
Illinois School for the Deaf
125 Webster
Jacksonville, IL  62650
217-479-4274  V/TTY
217-479-4290  Fax

Email: DHSVRCV at dhs.state.il.us

Website: http://morgan.k12.il.us/isd/

>>> grushkind at CSUS.EDU 04/22/03 01:21PM >>>
Hi all--

Our university is considering making a change in the Foreign Language
requirement to eliminate the third semester requirement.  This is not just
for ASL, but for all the F.L.s here at CSUS.  Their rationale is that since
it is agreed by all that we cannot expect fluency from the students after 3
semesters, and one of the points of the F.L. requirement is exposure to
other cultures and ways of thought, two semesters is felt to be sufficient
for this.

In my own experience, while students are not anywhere near FLUENT after 3
semesters, they are at the point where they are starting to become
COMFORTABLE with the language, and able to express more higher-level
thoughts.  My feeling is that two semesters is not enough for students to
truly begin to understand the other world view through language; it happens
with more exposure.

We need to provide a rationale for keeping the third semester requirement by
the beginning of May.  We do not want to use the "P word" proficiency, but
we want an argument that makes sense to people not in the FL field.

I have checked out Sherman Wilcox's site on academic acceptance, but it does
not have what I need.  Can anybody give me some ideas on this?

On a side note, I have noticed some comments from people at these meetings
that sound a little biased toward ASL, primarily because our enrollments are
so large in comparison to the other FLs.  From my discussion with people,
I'm getting the impression that they feel people are taking ASL instead of
other languages, even when they took other languages in HS, and that they
think (fac and students) ASL is a "shortcut" of some sort (I KNOW it's
not!).  Has anyone else experienced this kind of biased sentiment?

Donald A. Grushkin, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor/Coordinator, ASL Program
Eureka Hall Rm. 312 (Campus Zip # 6079)
California State University, Sacramento 95819
(916) 278-6622 Voice; 278-3465 TTY