- This article was originally published in the Bradley Herald the hub for FLEX alumni and their stories. Emin, a young performer and FLEX alumni from Azerbaijan, has spent years touring with musical greats and recording his own music. But now, Emin is rehearsing for perhaps his biggest performance to date: preparing to study musical theater at the prestigious American Musical and Dramatic Academy in Los Angeles this year on a full scholarship. Currently, Emin studies voice in Baku, Azerbaijan… Read More
- The American Learning Center (ALC), a private foreign language school in Moldova, has recently launched a new interactive course cheekily known as "Face Robots" on robotics, electronics, and hardware programming taught entirely in English. The course, which is part of the STEM education component of the American Language Center, aims to help students develop the mindset of an engineer, increase their ability to construct and program open-source robots, and further their overall programming… Read More
- The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (AAAS) formed the Commission on Language Learning in 2015 in an effort to evaluate the state of foreign language learning in the US for the first time in over 30 years. As a direct response to a bipartisan request from the US Congress, the Commission was formed to gather and analyze research on the benefits of foreign language learning for all age groups starting at pre-school and extending through secondary, higher education, and lifelong learning… Read More
- By Dr. Steven Byrd, Associate Professor of Spanish and Portuguese and Director of the Latin American Studies Minor at the University of New England In the early 21st-century, foreign language learning (and the humanities generally) in the United States has found itself on the defensive. Worrisome terms such as "crisis in the humanities" and "identity crisis" have been articulated in academic literature to describe the decline and apathy of language learning in the country. Ironically,… Read More
- Teachers of Critical Languages Program (TCLP) alumna Li Qiong was placed as a Mandarin teacher in Arizona in 2011. Since her return to China after her teacher exchange, she has facilitated a sister school program between her US and home school with two follow-up TCLP alumni grants focused on innovative international exchange. Li Qiong's 2015 project, Sister Schools Rising, shared Chinese language and culture and cemented the schools' partnership. In 2016, the China Education Association for… Read More
- The Boren Awards fund US undergraduate and graduate language study and research abroad in world regions critical to US national interests, including Africa, Asia, Central & Eastern Europe, Eurasia, Latin America, and the Middle East. Boren Awards promote longer-term linguistic and cultural immersion overseas, and are available to applicants in most fields of study. The application for the 2017 Boren Awards is now open. Boren Awards will give preference to applicants planning to study in… Read More
- Today, 40 million American jobs are tied to international trade, and 95 percent of the world's consumers live outside of American borders. In 2014 alone, half-a-million job postings in the US called for multilingual candidates.Speaking another language enables unencumbered movement and exchange in an interconnected economy. Yet, only seven percent of today's college students are enrolled in a language course. Of those enrolled, Spanish… Read More
- Interest in study abroad is strong in Kyrgyzstan, as evidenced by high attendance at the International Education Fair held in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan this past fall. The fair attracted 300 high school students, university students, and adults interested in pursuing education abroad. Attendees had the opportunity to receive individual consultations as well as to attend presentations on opportunities to study English, how to prepare for US university entrance exams, and how to apply for study abroad… Read More
- Ten alumni of the Future Leaders Exchange initiative (FLEX) from Kyrgyzstan were honored for their completion of the Exchanges to Internships Program this past September. The program selects a group of FLEX alumni each year to participate in internships with the Kyrgyz government. The program also celebrated its sixth year in Kyrgyzstan and its growing alumni community. At the ceremony, interns discussed the opportunities and challenges of working in government with potential future applicants… Read More
- The US Department of Education's Fulbright-Hays Group Projects Abroad (GPA) program awarded $240,840 to American Councils to provide scholarships to advanced undergraduate and graduate students of Russian and Persian participating in its semester programs in Moscow and Dushanbe.. American Councils will award a total of 36 scholarships 12 each per semester for spring 2017, fall 2017, and spring 2018 to participants in the Advanced Russian Language and Areas Studies Program (RLASP) in… Read More
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