College adds to language network High school immersion program joins current repertoire

Author: Scott Greene

The College expanded an already far-reaching foreign language repertoire by announcing the establishment of the Middlebury-Monterey Language Academy (MMLA), a summer language immersion program for pre-college students, in a press release on Tuesday, Sept 11.

"The Middlebury-Monterey Language Academy is another way in which Middlebury College is strategically addressing the growing need for superior foreign language learning opportunities in this country," President of the College Ronald. D. Liebowitz said in the press release.

The MMLA is a joint effort between the Language Schools of Middlebury College and the Monterey Institute of International Studies, a Middlebury affiliate, and will begin in 2008 with four-week residential camps offering Arabic, Chinese, French and Spanish. The initial sessions will take place on the campuses of St. Michael's College in Colchester, Vt., Menlo College in Atherton, Calif., and Hampshire College in Amherst, Mass.

According to Michael Geisler, vice president for Language Schools, Schools Abroad and Graduate Programs, the creation of MMLA compliments the 2005 acquisition of the Monterey Institute by extending the trajectory of language programs associated with the College.

"Every summer I get a number of phone calls from parents who really want something like the language schools for their children," said Geisler, who has ultimate oversight over the programs. "We don't accept middle and high school kids for the Middlebury language schools, because the language schools are fairly intensive and the kids usually aren't ready for that intensity."

Hence, the MMLA will not attempt to replicate the summer language schools, according to Geisler. In fact, students will only attend an hour of actual class per day during the week. Instead, there will be a heavy emphasis on more informal, extra-curricular learning through fun activities.

Macky Gaines, operations manager for Language Schools, agreed.

"This program was built upon the success of the Language Schools, looking at how we do things, how the immersion works and the 24 hours in language. These camps will be fashioned in that way," she said. "So, they're not affiliated, but rather it is trying to mimic the success of the language schools for the younger kids that are interested."

Still, students will be challenged to the point that each camper will receive more language exposure in four weeks with MMLA than during a full year of middle or high school classes. The College projects an initial enrollment of 500 students, and will organize subsequent summer sessions based on enrollment and language demand for the inaugural program.

"Through a carefully planned progression of language learning and culture studies designed for beginning to advanced levels, students will be challenged, improve on essential language skills, and have fun," MMLA Director David Toomey said.

By creating an opportunity for middle and high school students to study languages at an appropriate level of intensity, Geisler hopes that the MLA will only heighten the desire to study foreign languages among children.

"We want to give people the opportunity to participate in something that is Middlebury or Monterey from an early age so they get interested in language and pursue languages in their own schools where possible," Geisler said, "or maybe they will then go and ask the school boards for offerings in language."

The only relative precedent for the MLA program is Concordia Language Villages, which offers fourteen different languages to younger students in a summer camp-like atmosphere in Minnesota. Still, according to Jamie Northrup, director of institutional collaboration and marketing for the College's language schools and schools abroad, the College has very few peers, if any, in the realm of foreign language learning.

"There are many other summer programs out there that do some sort of language teaching, none of them do it to the level or the breadth that Middlebury does," Northrup said. "So we don't really have anyone to compare to."

"The interesting part about it all, as Middlebury students, we really are seen as the benchmark of high-level language learning," Northrup added. "We now take students from 7th and 8th grade all the way up to Masters Degrees, and it really expands the opportunities that Middlebury students have, and the opportunities are only going to continue to grow."