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5
Reducing Shortages
of Foreign Language
and Area Experts
A
s this report describes, the Title VI and Fulbright-Hays (Title VI/FH)
programs, under current law and by virtue of the way the programs
are administered, support the creation and maintenance of a broad
skill base and a long-term national capacity in languages and area studies
about every region of the world. They seek to create a pool of language and
area expertise for use not only in government, but also across the education
system, academia, nongovernmental organizations, and business. Although
they are aimed at creating a broad reservoir of expertise in a wide variety
of languages and areas, they can also help provide a modest pipeline into
the government to help address more immediate needs brought about by
rapidly changing geopolitics. This is not, however, the programs’ primary
statutory purpose.
The committee’s charge called for us to review the extent to which Title
VI/FH helps to reduce “shortages” of foreign language and area experts.
As outlined in Chapter 2, we have not conducted a systematic assessment
of the extent to which shortages exist,1 but instead acknowledge that the
significant demand for people with foreign language, area, and international
skills for government service, academia, K-12 education, and business sug-
gests that there is a significant unmet need.
The Title VI/FH programs can help to address this unmet need in at
least three ways: (1) producing graduates with language, area, and inter-
national skills who find employment in relevant fields, (2) serving as a
1 For
this reason the committee does not use the term “shortage,” referring instead to “de-
mand” or “unmet need.”
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INTERNATIONAL EDUCATION AND FOREIGN LANGUAGES
resource to government and other organizations to address unmet needs
more indirectly, and (3) producing graduates with increased levels of foreign
language proficiency. It is extremely difficult, however, for the committee
to answer the questions that Congress and critics of Title VI/FH are ask-
ing about the effectiveness of these programs in meeting the unmet needs
in these areas, because of the lack of good data. This chapter reviews the
limited available evidence of the programs’ effectiveness in these areas, but
much of the discussion focuses on data limitations.
JOB PLACEMENTS
The Title VI/FH programs overall play a role in internationalizing the
educational experience of undergraduates and graduates in the U.S. higher
education system. The programs promote international coursework, foreign
language study, and overseas experiences as important parts of education
in their own right. Consistent with several other recent national reports
(Committee for Economic Development, 2006; Commission on the Abra-
ham Lincoln Study Abroad Fellowship Program, 2005; U.S. Department of
Education, 2006a), the committee embraces the value of an understanding
of foreign languages and cultures as part of students’ general education.
Among the portfolio of Title VI/FH programs, the National Resource
Centers (NRC), Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) Fellowships,
and Centers for International Business Education and Research (CIBER)
programs have a particular emphasis on producing graduates with lan-
guage, area, and international expertise, although as reported in the previ-
ous chapter, this expertise is distributed among students from a wide range
of disciplines.2 The NRCs are required to report via the Evaluation of
Exchange, Language, International and Area Studies (EELIAS) database
system the aggregate number of job placements of its “graduates”—defined
as students with 15 or more area studies or language credit hours—and
of FLAS recipients who have graduated, in multiple sector categories,
including higher education, elementary or secondary education, federal
government, military, state or local government, nonprofit international
organization, for-profit international organization, nonprofit business, and
for-profit business. A graduate school category is included to capture those
who continue their education. Finally, a category for unemployed or out
of the labor market and one for unknown are also included. During grant
competitions, NRC applicants generally report similar placement data in
their applications to demonstrate their past performance. NRCs often con-
duct surveys of graduates so that the information includes job placements
2 Placement information for CIBER graduates is discussed in Chapter 9 on addressing busi-
ness needs.
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REDUCING SHORTAGES OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE AND AREA EXPERTS
not only of graduates in any given year (as required in EELIAS) but also of
all graduates and the jobs they obtain later in their careers.
The U.S. Department of Education (ED) has included job placement of
NRC and certain FLAS graduates, as well as language proficiency of FLAS
fellows (see the section on proficiency) as national performance measures
under the Government Performance and Results Act (GPRA). The NRC
measures have been in place since 1991 and, for the FLAS Program, since
1994. In reporting under GPRA, ED measures the performance of the NRC
and FLAS Programs based in part on the combined percentage of graduates
in each program who find employment in higher education, government,
or the military.3 Although data are reported on bachelor’s, master’s, and
Ph.D. recipients, ED has in the past reported on Ph.D. graduates only. ED’s
new performance measure, recently approved by the Office of Management
and Budget, will include master’s graduates. Graduates with bachelor’s
degrees are excluded because of the high likelihood that they will continue
with their education rather than seek employment, and because of greater
difficulty identifying the job placement for these graduates. ED measures
performance based on a combined category that includes higher educa-
tion, government, and the military, given their view that the programs are
designed to provide experts for both academia and government. ED has
reported an increase from 48.5 percent in 2001 to 71.8 percent in 2004
among Ph.D. students, as well as 16 percent of FLAS Ph.D. graduates in
2004, but the committee was unable to duplicate the numbers and ED was
unable to clarify the methodology used prior to 2004. In 2004, the NRC
graduate percentage was based on employed students only; it excluded stu-
dents for whom placement was not known, students who continued with
graduate study, and students who were not employed. For FLAS recipients,
the percentage is based on only the FLAS Ph.D. students who graduated in
the year in which they received a FLAS award.
At least three problems arise from the approach of reporting a single
percentage for the combined category. First, we do not know the specific
percentage of those going into each of the subcategories of government,
military, and higher education. Second, it adopts a narrow definition of suc-
cess. For example, those going into the private sector or the nonprofit arena
are not counted as a “success” (e.g., a Ph.D. who finds employment with a
defense contractor or a nonprofit contractor to the U.S. Department of State
would not be counted as a success, even though each may be performing
a task of value to the conduct of U.S. foreign policy.) Similarly, someone
who works for a nonprofit organization on international issues would
not be considered a success. Third, it is difficult to make judgments about
3 ED has performance targets that increase slightly each year for each of these two
measures.
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INTERNATIONAL EDUCATION AND FOREIGN LANGUAGES
TABLE 5-1 Cumulative Placements of Slavic and Middle Eastern Studies
Students from Title VI-Funded Institutions, 2001 to 2003, N and (%)
Elementary
Area and and State and
Degree Secondary Federal U.S. Local Foreign Graduate
Granted Education Government Military Government Government Study
Russian and East European Studies (2,452 records of student placement)a
B.A. 100 74 40 32 1 398
(n = 1,852) (5.3) (3.9) (2.1) (1.7) (0) (21.4)
M.A. 4 25 34 3 6 137
(n = 365) (1.0) (6.8) (9.3) (.8) (1.6) (37.5)
Ph.D. 2 9 0 0 3 8
(n = 233) (.8) (3.8) (0) (0) (.8) (3.4)
Middle East Studies (788 records of student placement)b
B.A. 47 32 7 24 0 186
(n = 715) (6.5) (4.4) (.1) (3.3) (0) (26)
M.A. 7 12 1 0 3 93
(n = 182) (.5) (6.6) (.5) (0) (1.6) (51.1)
Ph.D. 1 3 0 0 0 6
(n = 87) (1.1) (3.4) (0) (0) (0) (6.9)
aData
were available for 2,452 of 3,414 students.
bData
were available for 788 of 2,094 students.
SOURCE: Adapted from Brecht et al. (2007).
whether the above placement rates are good, bad, or indifferent without
some data from comparable groups, such as graduates with similar degrees
who did not receive an FLAS Fellowship or attended an institution without
an NRC. Placement rates for a similar comparison group would shed light
on whether the Title VI/FH programs add value in terms of employment.
Universities have raised legitimate concerns about whether they are
being held accountable for the wrong measure. These problems are further
aggravated by the fact that, although ED collects data that would enable
more detailed reporting, except for special requests, placement information
other than what is submitted for GPRA is generally not made available
outside of ED.
Where Graduates Are Going
A recent evaluation by Brecht et al. (2007) examines, in more detail
than does ED, the career paths of graduates from Title VI-funded Slavic and
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REDUCING SHORTAGES OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE AND AREA EXPERTS
International International Private Private
Higher Organizations, Organizations, Sector, Sector,
Education U.S.-based Outside U.S. For-Profit Nonprofit Unemployed Other
64 31 37 773 127 175 0
(3.4) (1.6) (1.9) (41.7) (6.8) (9.4) (0)
47 9 18 47 25 10 0
(12.8) (2.4) (4.9) (12.8) (6.8) (2.7) (0)
157 2 9 19 8 14 2
(67.4) (.8) (3.9) (8.1) (3.4) (6.0) (0)
73 20 6 231 50 39 0
(10.2) (2.8) (.8) (32.3) (6.9) (5.4) (0)
20 1 3 29 8 5 0
(11.0) (.5) (1.6) (16.0) (4.4) (2.7) (0)
57 1 2 7 7 3 0
(65.5) (1.1) (2.3) (8.5) (8.5) (3.4) (0)
Middle Eastern language and area studies programs, based on a more de-
tailed analysis of EELIAS data.4 These are summarized in Table 5-1. Place-
ments were not known for roughly a third of the Slavic studies students
and more than half of the Middle East studies students. The data do not
include graduates of other world area centers. Nonetheless, some patterns
are discernible from the table for graduates in these two fields:
• Most undergraduates tend to go on either to work in the private
sector or to continue with graduate study.
• The placements of students with master’s degrees are more dis-
persed, with the highest number continuing with graduate study.
• About two-thirds of students with Ph.D.s find employment at in-
stitutions of higher education.
4 Asthe developers of the EELIAS system, Brecht and colleagues had direct access to the
underlying data.
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INTERNATIONAL EDUCATION AND FOREIGN LANGUAGES
TABLE 5-2 Job Placements of NRC Graduates in 2000, as
Reported by ED
Percentage of Graduates
Field Bachelor’s Master’s Ph.D. Total
Elementary/secondary 3.6 4.5 1.7 3.6
education
Federal government 2.1 4.4 2.8 2.3
U.S. military 0.9 1.2 0.3 0.9
State and local government 1.4 2.0 1.2 1.4
Foreign government 0.1 1.0 1.3 0.3
Graduate study 15.1 17.7 2.9 14.9
Higher education 3.0 8.9 45.3 5.3
International organization 2.2 6.5 5.9 2.7
Private sector (for profit) 29.3 21.6 12.2 27.9
Nonprofit 4.4 6.7 3.4 4.6
Unemployed 4.5 3.6 3.8 4.4
Unknown 33.4 22.0 19.2 31.8
SOURCE: Spreadsheet based on data downloaded from EELIAS and provided in
response to separate requests from Heydemann (2004) and Kramer (2003) to ED.
Available: http://www.geocities.com/martinkramerorg/2004_03_17.htm [accessed
June 2006].
• Between about 4 and 7 percent find employment with the federal
government, with the highest percentage among graduates with master’s
degrees. The numbers who go on to the U.S. military are negligible, with
the exception of those receiving master’s degrees in Slavic studies.
Heydemann (2004) and Kramer (2003) both obtained placement data
from ED on 43,615 NRC graduates (all levels) in 2000. The job place-
ments for all NRC graduates—those who receive bachelor’s, master’s, and
Ph.D. degrees—from the data provided by ED, are shown in Table 5-2.
Heydemann and Kramer highlight different points about the data and come
to different conclusions. Heydemann (2004) points out that “more gradu-
ates of Middle East Centers go into some form of government service than
those who study any other world region except East Asia” (the data include
a world area code for individual university reports) and that “more than a
third of students who graduate[5] from Middle East centers go into the pri-
vate sector.” He concludes that the criticisms directed at Middle East cen-
ters in particular are misguided and that the idea that “Middle East centers
5 The committee notes that “graduate” in this context means a student who took 15 credit
hours or more of center courses. The student’s degree is very often from another department
in the university.
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REDUCING SHORTAGES OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE AND AREA EXPERTS
TABLE 5-3 FY 2003 NRC Master’s and Ph.D. Graduates
Number of Percentage
Graduates by Sector
Field Master’s Ph.D. Master’s Ph.D.
Elementary or secondary education 390 31 4.11 2.01
Federal government 273 40 2.88 2.59
Foreign government 38 22 0.40 1.43
Graduate study 806 36 8.49 2.33
Higher education 607 715 6.39 46.37
International organization (in U.S.) 124 30 1.31 1.95
International organization (outside U.S.) 80 44 0.84 2.85
Private sector (for profit) 1,366 181 14.39 11.74
Private sector (nonprofit) 588 61 6.19 3.96
State or local government 50 35 0.53 2.27
U.S. military 1,453 8 15.30 0.52
Unemployed or out of job market 219 53 2.31 3.44
Unknown 3,501 286 36.87 18.55
Total 9,495 1,542
SOURCE: Data provided by U.S. Department of Education [EELIAS].
are not training students for careers in business and government is false.”
Kramer (2003) focuses on the percentage of all graduates entering federal
government or military service and concludes that there is an “astonishingly
low rate of job placement in the federal government and the U.S. military
for grads who’ve taken foreign languages in Title VI centers.”6 In his view,
placements should be closer to at least 10 percent, the percentage he reports
that Title VI contributes to the university area studies programs. These dif-
ferent conclusions drawn from the same data highlight the difficulties in
interpreting these sorts of placement figures without a comparison group or
a definition and rationale by ED of what would constitute success.
As with the analysis conducted by Brecht et al., placement information
was unknown for almost one-third (31.8 percent) of the graduates. Of those
for whom data were available, the majority of Ph.D. graduates found jobs
in higher education (45.3); significant numbers of bachelor’s and master’s
students either entered graduate study (15.1 and 17.7 percent, respectively)
or found employment in the private sector (29.3 and 21.6 percent, respec-
tively); and relatively few obtained federal government positions, with the
largest percentage among graduates with master’s degrees (4.4 percent).
The committee conducted its own analysis of FY 2003 job placement
data in EELIAS, since that was the most complete year available in the
6 While language courses can be included as part of the 15 credit hours required to be con-
sidered an NRC graduate, courses are not exclusively language courses.
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0 INTERNATIONAL EDUCATION AND FOREIGN LANGUAGES
database (see Table 5-3). Data for undergraduates were excluded given the
widespread sentiment that they are unreliable. This analysis identified the
same overall trends as earlier analyses. ED, through its Office of Planning,
Evaluation and Policy Development, recently contracted with InfoUse to
conduct a survey of fellowship recipients of four ED graduate fellowship
programs between 1997 and 1999, including FLAS Fellowships and Doc-
toral Dissertation Research Abroad (DDRA) recipients. According to the
survey data collected by InfoUse, about one-quarter of DDRA recipients
worked within a year of completing the fellowship, while another one-half
worked within 2-3 years of their fellowship. For FLAS recipients, about 40
percent worked within a year of completing the fellowship, while another
29 percent did so within 2-3 years. Among those who reported that they
had at least one job related to the field they had studied with FLAS support,
three-quarters had worked in education, one-fifth in a private-sector job,
and one-fifth in foreign or international jobs. About 10 percent worked for
the military or other government positions.
Fellows in doctoral programs were far more likely than master’s fellows
to have worked in education (87 versus 53 percent) and master’s fellows
were more likely than doctoral fellows to work for the military or in an-
other government position, a private-sector position, or a foreign or inter-
national position. For DDRA recipients who reported they had held at least
one job related to the field they studied with DDRA support, 88 percent
worked in education and 11 percent in foreign or international jobs. About
7 percent worked for the military or other government positions.
These results reinforce the general trends identified using EELIAS data
for NRC graduates, although the number reporting government or military
positions is higher than in the NRC data. This may be due to the longer
time period covered. It also highlights a limitation of the reporting require-
ment for placement data on FLAS recipients. Although the EELIAS place-
ment data are reported when FLAS recipients complete their fellowship,
most are not yet employed—only 40 percent reported working within a
year. The performance measure related to placement based on these data is
in fact based on an extremely small number of recipients.
Tracking Problems
The process of collecting data on student placements upon gradua-
tion is difficult and expensive. During our site visits, the committee heard
that although NRCs try to track where students go after they leave the
university, it can be difficult. Both ED and university staffs with whom
the committee met reported that it is most difficult to track bachelor’s de-
gree graduates. They may feel less of an allegiance to their undergraduate
institution, and their location may be more fluid between graduation and
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REDUCING SHORTAGES OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE AND AREA EXPERTS
employment. Similarly, FLAS recipients, who often receive fellowships in
the early years of their graduate study, are often still in school several years
after the fellowship ends, yet placement data are collected when the fellow-
ship is completed. Some NRCs offer area studies degrees. NRCs reported
that these students, who have a direct relationship with the NRC, are often
easier to track. Other ”graduates,” those who take 15 or more credit hours
associated with the NRC but whose degree is in another department, are
more difficult to track. For many students, there may be a significant time
lag between graduation and finding employment. Another challenge is that
the employment sector alone may not capture the extent to which language,
area, or international skills are used on the job. The international content
of a given position or career may also evolve over time.
NRC staff visited by the committee uniformly expressed concern about
the burden of the extensive data collected, particularly given the decreasing
grant resources provided, and emphasized the significant staff resources
required. In some cases, NRCs are able to use university alumni offices to
get information on placements, but such information is often not known
for a large number of graduates. In other cases, NRCs conduct their own
surveys to determine placement outcomes. Some NRCs reported that their
government service numbers are undercounted because students who obtain
sensitive government positions are reluctant to report their status.
Some NRCs also conduct follow-up activities to track their gradu-
ates over time. One NRC, which follows all its graduates over time (see
Box 5-1), believed that its follow-up activities would probably be cur-
tailed as the alumni office’s efforts are adapted to better track the center’s
graduates.
Addressing Unmet Needs in Government
As discussed in Chapter 2, according to presentations to the committee
by representatives of different government agencies and government confer-
ence reports (U.S. Department of Defense, 2005; U.S. General Accounting
Office, 2002; U.S. Government Accountability Office, 2006) the federal
government is faced with significant and immediate unmet language needs,
especially for people with skills in critical languages. Although the commit-
tee views the Title VI/FH mandate as legitimately calling for it to address a
larger set of needs than just those of the federal government, in this section
we review issues related to meeting demand at the federal level, because of
the attention it has received.
Although the current data available from ED suggest that few NRC
graduates obtain government positions, these data have numerous limita-
tions, as discussed above, and may not accurately reflect the number of
graduates whose jobs include an international component. Merkx (2006)
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INTERNATIONAL EDUCATION AND FOREIGN LANGUAGES
BOX 5-1
Tracking Russia and East Europe Specialists
at Indiana University
The Russian and East European Institute (REEI) at Indiana University reports
a long history of producing experts for government service. In its most recent
application for federal funding, REEI provides a list of 111 graduates who have
entered federal jobs over the past 15 years, with the largest groups going into the
Army and the State Department. The application also identifies REEI-affiliated
graduates who have entered high-level government positions, including former
Central Intelligence Agency director Robert Gates; former U.S. ambassador to
Russia James Collins; and Victor Jackovich, who was formerly U.S. ambassador
to Bosnia and Herzegovina, U.S. ambassador to Slovenia, and senior political
advisor to the commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan.
The institute director acknowledged the difficulty of tracking REEI graduates to
obtain information on student placements required by ED. During the 1990s, the
center explored the university alumni association data records, but the database
included only information on students’ major field of study, and it was not possible
for the alumni association to complete the necessary coding to identify all students
about whom the institute was required to report. Instead, REEI created its own
database of all university graduates who enrolled in Russia and East European
courses from 1958 to the present, with contact and employment information on
2,500 students. In the last year, the alumni association has made software up-
grades that will allow more flexibility in tracking.
The institute sends an e-mail each summer to all those listed, asking about
changes in address, new jobs, and any accomplishments to be noted in the news-
letter. It explains that the information is needed both to report to ED on graduates’
success and also to provide networking opportunities for current students moving
into the job market. The response rates vary, depending on what the graduates
are doing. Those in academia usually respond promptly, and retirees respond oc-
casionally. However, graduates working in government and public service are often
too busy to reply. As one way of maintaining contact with this group, the institute
hosts an annual reception or dinner in the Washington, DC, area for all university
alumni who are interested in Russian and East European studies. More than 100
university graduates attended the November 2006 event.
NOTE: Information contained in this box came from a committee site visit (2006) and review
of the university’s NRC application (provided by the U.S. Department of Education).
suggests that a better way of assessing whether NRCs are producing gradu-
ates to meet government needs would be to conduct a survey of current
language or area experts already in government, a tack that would show a
different result. He and others point to anecdotal evidence that many ex-
perts in government attend or have attended NRC institutions (Interagency
Language Roundtable, 2006b; Heydemann, 2004; Merkx, 2006). Staff at
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REDUCING SHORTAGES OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE AND AREA EXPERTS
universities visited also cited numerous cases of graduates who now work
for the federal government.
Government downsizing, with traditional government jobs increasingly
being done by contractors, may also mean that the available statistics do
not fully capture all NRC graduates who help to address federal needs. Ac-
cording to the Congressional Budget Office, from 1985 to 2000, the size of
the federal workforce (excluding the U.S. Postal Service) decreased by 19
percent, largely but not solely due to cuts in military personnel (U.S. Con-
gressional Budget Office, 2001). This has been offset by increased reliance
by the federal government on contractors—private companies, nonprofits,
consultants, temporary employees, etc., that some analysts call a “shadow
government” (Light, 1999). An example from the international context is
the U.S. Freedom Support Act, which funded projects to help the transition
to democracy and market-oriented economies in the former Soviet Union in
the 1990s. Much of this funding went to universities, in particular Harvard
University, and to a wide variety of nonprofit and for-profit organizations
and consultants. Presumably, many Slavic studies graduates went to work
at these organizations, which helped carry out U.S. foreign policy toward
former communist nations. These graduates would be reported as being
placed in higher education or private organizations, yet they were respond-
ing to a government need.
Other considerations, such as a lack of awareness of government needs,
recruitment issues, problematic security clearance processes, and the diffi-
culty of matching skills with job openings are also possible reasons that the
percentages of students pursing careers in the government and military are
not higher. Noteworthy are the challenges that graduates of the National
Security Education Program (NSEP) in the Department of Defense (DoD)
often face in obtaining a federal government position to fulfill their service
requirement. In short, there are many barriers to placement in a government
position—these are barriers that Title VI/FH cannot be expected to solve.
Inadequate Communication of Government Needs to the Field
Although reports of unmet needs in government have surfaced for
years, there have been relatively limited efforts to specify the skills or
quantify particular needs and then communicate them to universities, which
might help build the necessary skills. According to Ruther (2003), there
is “not much reliable information about the global competences of the
government’s current workforce or its strategic needs for globally com-
petent talent” (p. 1). A recent Government Accountability Office report
on progress made by the State Department in meeting its language needs
calls on it to produce a prioritized assessment of language skills and then
act to meet these needs, particularly in countries of strategic importance
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REDUCING SHORTAGES OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE AND AREA EXPERTS
the 1980s, who credited the problem of low language proficiency to a drift
in the mission of the programs. When Title VI was created as part of the
National Defense Education Act, one of its main purposes was to address
shortfalls in language expertise for national security purposes. When the
program was rolled into the Higher Education Act, he asserts, the emphasis
on language proficiency was lost, and more funding went into projects with
an area studies rather than a language emphasis.
Brecht and Rivers (2000) also make the case that the reason language
proficiency is not as high as it should be among graduates of Title VI/FH-
funded programs is because too much funding has shifted toward area
studies, rather than languages. In their updated study, Brecht et al. (2007)
argue for a periodic review and rebalancing of resources directed toward
languages versus area studies. Table 5-4, drawn from the updated study,
shows that Title VI institutions produce a much higher number of disserta-
tions in Slavic and Middle Eastern studies as opposed to Slavic and Middle
Eastern languages.
However, the table also shows a similar imbalance between area studies
and language dissertations at non-Title VI institutions. Similarly, a survey
of the membership of the Middle East Studies Association (Betteridge,
2003) shows a decline in the numbers of students studying Middle Eastern
languages, but an increase in those studying Middle Eastern politics and
economics. Presumably most, if not all, of those pursuing these advanced
degrees have acquired some language competency, but the focus of their
professional interest is not foreign languages or linguistics.
The committee can suggest a number of possible reasons, other than a
shift in federal funding, for the preponderance of dissertations being com-
pleted in area studies rather than languages. In general, a language degree
may not be as marketable as that in another discipline. Some academics
have observed that there is less prestige in teaching languages at universities
than other subjects. A person with a Ph.D. in a language might be forced
into teaching many sections of introductory Arabic, for example, but might
TABLE 5-4 Dissertations in Slavic and Middle Eastern Studies, Title VI
and Non-Title VI Institutions, 1997-2004
Number and % of Number and % of
Dissertations Completed Dissertations Completed at
Dissertation area at Title VI Institutions Non-Title VI Institutions
Slavic area studies 578 (50) 580 (50)
Slavic language 81 (57) 60 (43)
Middle East area studies 462 (44) 565 (56)
Middle East language 25 (31) 55 (69)
SOURCE: Adapted from Brecht et al. (2007).
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0 INTERNATIONAL EDUCATION AND FOREIGN LANGUAGES
TABLE 5-5 Total Graduate and Undergraduate Enrollments in the Most
Popular Language Courses at Title VI-funded Institutions, by Region,
2001-2002
Specialized
Advanceda
Language Elementary Intermediate Advanced
Swahili 483 192 59 16
Uzbek 32 16 0 0
Japanese 5,602 2,973 1,350 977
Russian 1,604 898 724 778
Arabic 1,895 770 279 326
Hindi-Urdu 538 167 16 128
Tagalog 597 242 45 38
Chinese 4,714 2,174 1,350 1,151
Korean 1,259 635 563 302
Spanish 49,054 37,017 6,989 11,800
French 7,149 6,218 1,580 2,546
aThese are advanced courses for a specific purpose or for a specific aspect of a language or
culture; examples are commercial or medical Chinese or Chinese poetry.
SOURCE: Adapted from data on enrollments by world region at http://elctl.msu.edu/
summaries [accessed April 2007].
have more interest in teaching some aspect of Arabic literature or culture.
Given these circumstances, the imbalance is not surprising.
At the same time, NRCs seem to have significant enrollments in lan-
guage study, particularly less commonly taught languages, and offer gradu-
ated courses from elementary to advanced language study. Although course
level cannot be equated to any standard measure of language proficiency,
advanced language courses offered by NRCs, as reported by the e-LCTL
initiative, have had significant enrollments (see Table 5-5). During site vis-
its, NRCs regularly reported increased enrollments in less commonly taught
languages and using funds to seed new, advanced-level language courses.
(See Box 5-2 for examples of Title VI/FH funds being used to expand in-
struction in Arabic language and culture.)
Heritage Language Speakers
Heritage language speakers represent a valuable national resource for
developing and strengthening proficiency in less commonly taught lan-
guages, including languages currently defined as critical languages. A re-
cent national gathering of experts from government agencies, academia,
industry, and the language community recommended (National Language
Conference, 2005, p. 9):
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BOX 5-2
Expanding Arabic Instruction at Select Title VI Universities
During site visits, the committee found a number of examples of Title VI/FH
funds being used to expand the teaching and learning of Arabic language and
culture. Some highlights:
• t New York University (NYU), Title VI funding has supported a growing
A
program of Arabic instruction. Between academic years 1995-1996 and 2005-
2006, average annual enrollment in all levels of Arabic nearly tripled, increas-
ing from 112 to 302 as more students became interested in Arabic. Enrollment
in elementary Arabic I quadrupled, growing from 23 in 2000-2001 to 93 in fall
2006, while enrollment in advanced Arabic I surged from 2 to 26, an increase
of over 8 times.
• n 1990, NYU had just one full-time Arabic instructor. By the end of 2006, NYU
I
had four full-time language instructors and one part-time language instruc-
tor. Because NYU had already made a commitment to expanding its Arabic
language program, it was well positioned to respond to increased student
enrollments after 9/11 by leveraging Title VI funds to create a new full-time
Arabic faculty position in 2002-2003. By the end of 2006, NYU had four full-
time Arabic language instructors and one part-time Arabic instructor. In the
past decade, NYU has hired 12 tenure/tenure-track faculty positions in Middle
Eastern studies.
• he Center for Near Eastern Studies at the University of California, Los Ange-
T
les, also used Title VI funding to respond to growing demand for Arabic. Funds
were used to hire additional lecturers and teaching assistants, to develop new
courses in Iraqi Arabic and media Arabic, to provide workshops for language
instructors, and to purchase film and multimedia materials to support language
learning.
• t San Diego State University, LRC grants to the Language Acquisition Re-
A
source Center since 1990 have focused on “distinguished-level” (advanced
professional proficiency or ILR level 4) language learning. Building on this
expertise and with support from the university, the LRC grant, and an NSEP
institutional grant, the university created the Center for the Advancement of
Distinguished Language Proficiency (ADLP) in 2002, which has been institu-
tionalized as a program offered by the Language Acquisition Resource Center.
That program focuses on moving students from ILR level 3 to level 4 in two
strategically critical languages—Persian-Farsi and Arabic—while simultane-
ously training a cadre of teachers to teach at this level. The center offered
professional Arabic summer intensive courses for federal employees in 2004
and 2005. Currently, it is developing an intensive course in Iraqi Arabic for the
military. Recently, the LRC received a special appropriation from Congress to
develop curricula and courses in critical languages, with a focus on language
and culture for military and civilian personnel needing in-depth intensive for-
matted courses. Federal funding to the university also helps to train Reserve
Officers’ Training Corps students in Arabic. To meet growing demand from
these students, the university offered extra sections of Arabic in fall 2006.
NOTE: Information contained in this box came from a 2006 committee site visit.
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Government agencies, academic institutions, and private enterprises should
develop plans, reinvigorate existing programs, and provide incentives to
build upon the foreign language skills and cultural understanding of Amer-
ica’s heritage communities. Such incentive programs should increase our
national capability in foreign languages—especially in the less commonly
taught languages.
Recognizing this potential, federal intelligence agencies and the military
have increased their recruitment of heritage speakers (Chu, 2006), although
investigators have sometimes had problems in conducting the required
background checks in countries in which first-generation speakers learned
the language (Kuenzi, 2004). ED and DoD have undertaken targeted efforts
involving heritage communities. For example, the ED Foreign Language
Assistance Program and the DoD National Flagship Language Program
have provided funding to the Dearborn Public Schools and Michigan State
University (also an LRC), to collaborate with one another and the local
Arabic heritage community to expand and strengthen Arabic instruction
in elementary and middle schools. The partners will develop curriculum
and aligned assessments and establish a professional development and
Arabic teacher certification program that meets Michigan Department of
Education requirements. The program will also provide scholarships for
40 Dearborn students with advanced Arabic skills for further study at the
university level (Michigan State University, 2007).
In addition, ED recently awarded LRC funding to the UCLA Center
for World Languages and the University of California Consortium for
Language Learning and Teaching to establish a new National Heritage
Language Center. The center’s overall mission is to develop the new field
of heritage language education. The proportion of individuals who speak
a language other than English at home—17.8 percent nationally—is higher
in California (39.4 percent) and still higher in Los Angeles Center (54.4)
(Kagan, 2006), well positioning the center for this task. The new center
will build on previous research on the different learning needs of heritage
language and foreign language learners (Kagan and Dillon, 2001; Valdés,
2000). Research suggests that heritage speakers attain high proficiency best
if they are taught in separate classes that meet their specific needs.
The center has launched a variety of research, development, and dis-
semination projects. These include gathering baseline data on demographics
and patterns of intergenerational language transmission in selected heri-
tage language communities, building a framework for developing heritage
language materials, and researching the grammar of heritage language
speakers. Another focus of the center is teacher education to reduce the
shortage of heritage language instructors. As discussed in Chapter 4, some
NRCs and LRCs have also undertaken targeted outreach efforts to preserve
and develop the proficiency of heritage language speakers. However, while
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utilizing heritage speakers has clear potential to help address shortages in
foreign language and area experts, and various Title VI-funded efforts to
support development of their expertise is underway, the available evidence
did not enable conclusive resolution of this complex area. Further explora-
tion of effective ways to develop and utilize heritage language competences
is warranted.
Study Abroad and Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellowships
Davidson and Lehmann (2005) found that oral language proficiency
scores of U.S. alumni of the overseas Russian language programs funded by
the Group Projects Abroad Program were higher after the experience. The
majority of alumni identified the experience as among the top three “most
significant learning experiences” of their lives. The program had its greatest
impact in increased language proficiency, followed by increases in cultural
knowledge and interest. Linton and VandeBerg (2006) similarly found that
study abroad students had significantly greater language gains and greater
improvement in intercultural sensitivity than control group students. They
also found an association between length of time abroad and greater im-
provement in language proficiency.
Other than the DDRA Program that funds doctoral research abroad,
FLAS Fellowships are the main vehicle through which Title VI/FH programs
fund foreign language and area study by individual graduate students. The
statute currently restricts eligibility to graduate students. Grants have been
evenly distributed among commonly and less commonly taught languages
and, as discussed earlier in the chapter, are distributed among students from
a range of disciplines. In 2003, the number of fellowships jumped from 196
to 420, with the increase focusing on less commonly taught languages.
Although the FLAS Fellowships are not specifically designed to subsi-
dize study abroad, a minority of students do go abroad. ED policies related
to FLAS fellowships make it difficult for grantees to use their award for
overseas study. The ED requires prior approval of individual requests to use
funds for overseas travel, a requirement that is viewed by NRC faculty and
staff, as well as by students, as a barrier to achieving higher levels of lan-
guage proficiency. Federal government regulations require travel on U.S. air
carriers, which is frequently more costly than non-U.S. carriers and presents
a particular concern, since travel funds are not included in the stipend for
academic year fellowships. In addition, from the committee’s conversations
with NRC staffs, there is a clear lack of understanding about ED policies.
One NRC thought that overseas travel for academic year fellowships was
prohibited. ED staff acknowledged that a series of myths about the program
has evolved, which they have worked to dispel.
Despite the benefits of study abroad, between 2003 and 2005, almost
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three-quarters (73 percent) of FLAS recipients studied in the United States
only, 23 percent spent a summer overseas, and only 3 percent spent a year
overseas. Of those who studied overseas in 2005, the top 10 host countries,
in descending order, were Brazil, India, China, Mexico, Russia, Egypt,
Turkey, Poland, Japan, and Ecuador.
Many of these countries are allies or are of strategic concern to the
United States, and several of the languages spoken in them are currently
considered critical: Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, Russian, and Turkish. It is
unclear if requests for study in these countries are more readily approved by
ED. However, since Latin America is the most common destination, study
there could also be due to the relative proximity (and low travel cost) and
safety of the host country, the ability of the home university to subsidize
travel, or both. In the case of Brazil, five NRCs (of 40 Latin America NRCs
included in the analysis) account for the vast majority of FLAS recipients
studying there. These five centers sent an average of 25 FLAS fellows, com-
pared with the average of 5 students for the other 35 centers. Information
is not available related to why these five centers have been so much more
successful than others.
Assessing Language Proficiency of FLAS Recipients
The only assessment of FLAS recipients’ language proficiency that
ED requires is a self-rating. Recipients are required to rate their speaking,
reading, and writing proficiency based on six language levels in each of
these three areas, ranging from no ability to that of a native speaker. The
language levels are intended to approximate an approach to proficiency
assessment that has been used by the American Council on the Teaching
of Foreign Languages (ACTFL), but without the necessary detail. There is
no available evidence of the reliability or validity of these self-ratings, with
interpretation of the meaning of language levels left to individual students.
FLAS recipients report both their pre- and post-FLAS ratings at the same
time (upon completion of their fellowship), which raises concerns about
the reliability and validity of the ratings. The ED uses the average change
across the three areas (speaking, reading, and reading) as a performance
measure for the FLAS Program and is planning to use it for the DDRA,
Faculty Research Abroad (FRA), and GPA programs.
In 2005, ED added an item to the EELIAS database asking if the fellow
was tested using a standardized instrument and, if so, the name of the in-
strument and the pre and post scores. This requirement happened about the
same time that ED started encouraging proficiency assessment through the
priorities applied in its competitions (see Appendix C), sending the message
to grantees that proficiency measurement is a priority. On the basis of the
data submitted to ED as of March 2006, only 4 percent of students (157 of
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REDUCING SHORTAGES OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE AND AREA EXPERTS
3,835) reported having been tested using a standardized approach; an oral
proficiency interview was the most commonly reported tool (28.9 percent),
with a variety of other instruments making up the balance.
During the committee’s site visits, while all NRCs reported assessment
as an important objective, they reported a variety of approaches to doing
so. University staff indicated that, in many cases, students are assessed on
the basis of a short conversation with a linguist or language teacher, or
with an oral interview. These interviews may range from a brief conversa-
tion with a language teacher to a structured interview along the lines of an
ACTFL oral proficiency interview (OPI) but not conducted or rated by an
ACTFL-certified examiner. Many NRCs and LRCs were exploring or inter-
ested in alternative approaches to assessing language proficiency. This wide
variety and inconsistency of methods for assessing language proficiency
and the concerns about ED’s self-rating method made it difficult to assess
the language proficiency component of Title VI/FH success in “reducing
shortages of foreign language and area experts.” It also underscores the
need to develop consistent and valid assessments of language proficiency,
as discussed in Chapter 12.
Given the considerable interest in assessing the language proficiency of
FLAS students, one might well ask why these assessments are being done
so inconsistently. The short answer to this question is that, for many lan-
guages, particularly many of the less commonly taught ones, there simply
are no assessments, so faculty must rely on their own resources to assess
their students. For languages for which assessments are available, some
do not meet professional standards for educational measurement (e.g.,
American Educational Research Association et al., 1999), are too costly to
administer, or both.
The dominant approach to language proficiency assessment in Title
VI/FH programs is a face-to-face interview. There is considerable varia-
tion across languages and programs in how this interview is administered
and scored. Some of these are “unofficial” interviews based generally on
the ACTFL standards. Others are “official” oral proficiency interviews
conducted by examiners who have been certified by ACTFL, whose scale
has been developed for use in academic settings. To be implemented prop-
erly, the ACTFL approach requires trained testers based on the ACTFL
proficiency guidelines. (See Appendix D for a brief history of the OPI,
the ACTFL scale, and the ILR scale, which is used mostly in government
settings.)
Proponents of the ACTFL scale assert that it has provided a common
framework for foreign language educators to describe student achievement,
and the proficiency guidelines have become ingrained in the teaching, test-
ing, programmatic, and research activities of a significant segment of the
foreign language profession (Liskin-Gasparro, 2003). In a commissioned
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paper prepared for the committee, Malone (2006) argues that the OPI’s
greatest strengths are twofold: (1) it provides professional development
of the testers who participate in the training sessions and (2) testing oral
proficiency positively impacts instruction by emphasizing the importance
of speaking. However, researchers and measurement specialists have raised
concerns about the OPI’s validity and other technical qualities, highlighting
the need for additional research and development to identify alternative
approaches for measuring language proficiency levels (see Chapter 12).
LRCs have been prompted by ED to develop new approaches to for-
eign language assessment, in part to address the expense and limited avail-
ability of the OPI. A range of them have consequently been developed or
are currently under development at multiple organizations, including the
Center for Applied Linguistics (2006), a collaborative partner with the
National Capital Language Resource Center and the National K-12 For-
eign Language Resource Center. In addition, a consortium of two LRCs
(Brigham Young University and San Diego State University) and three other
institutions (the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages,
the Center for Applied Linguistics, and the Defense Language Institute) is
developing the computer-assisted screening tool (CAST), with IRS funding.
In the fall of 2006, the consortium had developed and was beginning to
pilot test web-delivered oral proficiency test modules in Modern Standard
Arabic and Spanish. It is hoped that these low-stakes tests will encourage
instructors to conduct periodic assessments of students’ progress, punc-
tuated by semi-annual or annual OPIs. The Center for Applied Second
Language Studies (CASLS), University of Oregon, is developing the stan-
dards-based measurement of writing and listening proficiency for the high
school grades in French, German, Spanish and Turkish (Center for Applied
Second Language Studies, 2006c), the National Online Early Language
Learning Assessment (2006b), and the CASLS pilot assessments (2006a).
However, the extent to which these efforts are coordinated or address the
other underlying concerns outlined here is unclear.
CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
The Title VI/FH programs, particularly the NRCs and the FLAS Pro-
gram, play an important role in addressing unmet needs for individuals with
foreign language, area, and international knowledge. This includes produc-
ing graduates for academia, government, and business as well as exposing a
wide range of students to international and foreign language content.
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Job Placement
Title VI/FH programs aim to produce a broad range of language and
area experts needed to enhance U.S. security and prosperity over the long
term. Given this broad goal, job placements in government, academia, and
nongovernmental organizations are all reasonable outcomes that serve
broad national needs. Available reporting categories, and the use of those
categories by ED, do not provide an adequate measure of success. At a
minimum, ED should report on placements in a range of areas, monitor
trends, and facilitate transparency of data that will enable public discourse
(see Chapter 12).
Although the available data are limited at best, they suggest that un-
dergraduates from Title VI-funded programs are most likely to find em-
ployment in the private sector. Among graduate students, those whose
placements are known tend to go into academia. Thus, relatively small
numbers of undergraduates and graduates appear to go on to employment
with the federal government or the military. However, the reporting catego-
ries used may not accurately capture job responsibilities.
More importantly, for an NRC graduate or recipient of a Title VI/FH
fellowship, choices about career are still best understood as a matter of
individual choice and timing. These programs do not have service require-
ments, so there is no obligation or expectation for students to pursue
careers in government. Relatively low percentages employed in the federal
government can also be partially attributable to insufficient communica-
tion of government needs and career opportunities, negative perceptions of
government service, difficulty matching graduate skills with specific jobs,
and a cumbersome security clearance process. Even DoD’s NSEP, which has
a government service requirement, faces challenges in placing its graduates
in government jobs, although there has been recent progress. Government
efforts have improved in the past several years, with more information pro-
vided on specific language needs and government career opportunities.
National Resources
Title VI/FH programs assist in providing needed services and resources
to the nation in other ways that cannot be measured by job placements or
language proficiency. The programs teach a large number of less commonly
taught languages, reach a large number of students, maintain the capacity
to teach less commonly taught and other languages that may be crucial in
the future, and produce resources that can be drawn on by the nation as a
whole. Although there is no systematic evidence, the committee heard many
anecdotal reports and examples reported during site visits of the NRCs act-
ing as a resource or training ground for current government personnel.
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Language Proficiency
FLAS Fellowships include the study of language as their objective, but
despite evidence that overseas study is an effective way to achieve greater
oral proficiency, very few FLAS recipients study overseas, and ED policies
tend to discourage such study for academic year fellowships. Some grantees
have figured out ways to work with these policies to enable fellows to study
abroad, but this experience does not appear to be widely practiced.
Conclusion: Although overseas study has been shown to increase
speaking proficiency, the Department of Education’s policies discour-
age full-year overseas study by FLAS recipients.
Recommendation 5.1: The Department of Education should modify
its policy guidelines to encourage overseas study by Foreign Language
and Area Studies fellows.
ED should consider ways to encourage FLAS fellows to study abroad
in well-designed experiences that are targeted toward gains in language and
cultural competency. This might include clarifying policies, continuing to
streamline the approval process, and including a travel stipend in academic
year awards. The committee acknowledges, however, that such policies
will not be able to address situations in which students’ safety might be in
jeopardy and that travel to some countries where language expertise is most
needed will not be practicable.
Assessment of Language Ability
Even though Title VI/FH programs are being encouraged to assess
the language proficiency of their students in standardized ways, at pres-
ent this is not being done in ways that permit ED to monitor them for
accountability purposes or that enable universities to evaluate their own
effectiveness. The ED has for several years relied on self-ratings to assess the
proficiency of FLAS recipients, even though there is no available evidence
of the reliability or validity of their approach. ED has also encouraged the
development and use of other standardized instruments, partly by includ-
ing as a competitive priority in its last competition “activities designed to
demonstrate the quality of the center’s or program’s language instruction
through the measurement of student proficiency in the less and least com-
monly taught languages.” The oral proficiency interview is the most widely
used standardized approach in the United States and, among the few who
use such an approach, appears to be the most commonly used standard-
ized approach with FLAS recipients. However, concerns have been raised
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about the validity and the meaningfulness of OPI ratings, and many have
argued that further research and development on assessment approaches
is needed. Some universities have turned to language-specific tests or other
assessment approaches. In a majority of cases, however, universities restrict
their assessment to the self-rating required by ED. Several of the LRCs
have developed new approaches based on the OPI, and NRCs have begun
to adopt these instruments for reporting the language proficiency of their
FLAS recipients.
Conclusion: The language proficiency of FLAS students is not at pres-
ent being adequately assessed.
Recommendation 5.2: The Department of Education should stop us-
ing its current self-assessment approach and develop an alternative ap-
proach to measuring foreign language proficiency with demonstrated
reliability and validity.
If ED determines that continued use of a self-assessment mechanism is
necessary to measure performance at a national level, research to establish
the validity and reliability of its current approach, or of an alternative
approach, should be conducted to ensure that the approach used meets
professional testing standards (American Educational Research Associa-
tion et al., 1999) and produces meaningful results. Research suggests that
the usefulness of self-assessment varies from one setting to another and is
dependent on having a well-developed and well-implemented instrument
(see Ross, 1998; Sasaki, 2003).
In the long term, focused attention on language assessment is needed.
The primary reasons for the current lack of adequate standardized assess-
ment appear to be (1) the lack of a single standardized measure of language
proficiency that could be used with all languages, and for all programs, for
accountability purposes, and (2) inadequate capacity for ongoing research
and development of language assessments. In Chapter 12, the committee
urges the federal government to support targeted research and development
on language assessment to address this shortcoming and develop new ap-
proaches to foreign language assessment (Recommendation 12.3).
The committee specifically recommends that the language proficiency
of FLAS recipients be assessed. However, we note that NRCs may want
to assess the language proficiency of all students, particularly students
receiving an area studies degree, to improve their own accountability.
Universities should rely on the best available methods in conducting these
assessments.
