Students are strongly opposed to including a foreign language requirement in the undergraduate curriculum, a recent Herald poll found.
Only 27 percent of students said they favor a requirement for all undergraduates to study a foreign language while at the University, and 70 percent said they opposed such a requirement. 3 percent did not know or had no answer. The poll, conducted from Jan. 29 to Feb. 2, has a margin of error of 4.7 percent with 95 percent confidence.
Brown remains the only Ivy League school that does not require its undergraduates to study a foreign language as a general education requirement. All general education requirements were abolished with the introduction of the New Curriculum in 1969. Currently, only a few concentrations, such as international relations, have a language requirement.
The University is beginning a broad review of its undergraduate curriculum - University officials yesterday announced the creation of a Task Force on Undergraduate Education - but Dean of the College Katherine Bergeron said there has been no discussion of requiring undergrads to take a foreign language.
But she said, "It is worth raising the question: In an increasingly international world ... where the place of the United States and therefore English language dominance is not to be assured, what is the place of language instruction in the education of our undergraduates?"
"I don't think that this is a surprising answer," Bergeron said. "I don't think that requirements are generally viewed with great enthusiasm."
Jovan Julien '10 said he believes "there are other ways to get kids to take a foreign language that would be more in keeping with Brown's academic policies. Most people are here because they don't want the core requirements (of other institutions)."
Many of the students opposed to the possibility of a required language believe requirements result in classes with few enthusiastic students.
"I think taking a language is a good thing, but forcing a language isn't," said Ethan Risom '10, who took Spanish his first semester at Brown.
But Dikshya Thapa GS said a foreign language requirement was a must for students in any university setting.
"It helps you learn other cultures," Thapa said. "If you make the attempt to learn another language, you broaden your horizons."
Thapa also spoke of sensitizing students and faculty to the importance of another language, especially with the University's recent focus on internationalizing Brown.
Bergeron said the last time the University comprehensively reviewed its undergraduate programs, including foreign languages, was in 1989 under then-Dean of the College Sheila Blumstein. The newly formed task force, a faculty-student committee that will review the University's undergraduate program over the next year, will produce a report similar to the one conducted 18 years ago.
Blumstein, a professor of cognitive and linguistic sciences, said the 1989 study found a lack of required courses had resulted in an increase of students taking language courses since the institution of the New Curriculum.
"One of the things we looked at was to what extent were students doing what we hoped they were doing," Blumstein said. "It just reinforced the (administration's view) that students were choosing to study broadly and doing what they wanted to do."
Blumstein said the study underscored the degree to which students had realized the importance of second-language fluency. But she also warned that Brown should again be asking its student body about the perceived importance of a foreign language.
"To what extent does the student body understand the importance of knowing another culture, and that to know that other culture you must know the language of that culture?" Blumstein said.
Bergeron said Blumstein's report would be examined by the task force members as one of their first "summer readings."
