Card-carrying liberal that I am, I generally don’t sing the praises of President Bush or Gov. Taft. Today, however, appears to be that cold day in hell because both deserve to be commended for their support of foreign language education. At the beginning of this month President Bush launched a national initiative to promote the study of foreign languages. Citing the inextricable link between national security, economic growth and foreign language mastery, Bush pledged $114 million to promote foreign language education.

In his State of the State address, Taft proposed that Ohio high school students be required to complete two units of foreign language study. While this is still woefully insufficient, it is an improvement over the current standard (which has no foreign language component) and the sooner it is implemented, the better off Ohio high school students will be. As Bush and Taft have both observed, foreign language education is a critical component of future success. We have neo-liberal economic policies and thousands of American troops deployed in the Middle East. According to the department of education, 200 million Chinese schoolchildren are learning English, while only 24,000 of their American counterparts are learning Chinese. It’s not hard to imagine who will have the future economic edge. These new initiatives will synchronize our economic and political agendas with our educational standards.

Ironically, OSU appears to be prepared to take a step backwards on this issue. The recently released McHale Report on GEC reform at OSU fails to acknowledge the importance of foreign language in today’s economic and political atmosphere. Citing student dissatisfaction with their current foreign language requirement, the report suggests that the current failings of the language requirement could be remedied with a two pronged approach. First, it suggests that individual colleges should set the requirement “as the colleges are best able to determine whether their students will need course work through level 104 for their education and/or future careers.” The implication is not that colleges wish to increase the requirement, but rather that for many students it is onerous and unproductive. Second, the report suggests that students should be encouraged to pursue foreign language minors by using advanced language course work to fulfill count as social science, historical study and Arts and Literature NMRs (Non-major requirement, the renamed GEC).

The first undermines the beneficial nature of foreign language study to all students. Not only is it critical to professional and civic development, it also teaches analytical thinking and grammar. Admittedly after the first four courses of a foreign language sequence students don’t achieve fluency. However, to allow colleges to diminish the current inadequate standards merely creates a more substantial deficiency. There are already too many programs that don’t include foreign language components: We don’t to encourage other colleges to do down this road. Second, while foreign language minors are a logical mechanism to encourage foreign language study, they should not be pursued to the detriment of other course work. There are NMRs/ GECs in the social science, historical study and Arts and Literature because these fields, like foreign language study, help build distinct aspects of an intellectual foundation. The McHale Report itself lists different learning objectives for each of these categories; the skills formed in these courses are not interchangeable.

These suggestions fail to truly improve the undergraduate experience. As President Bush noted, as our economy becomes increasingly globalized and we continue to fight an international war on terror, language skills are crucial in all fields. Graduates who are marketable on a global scale are going to be more successful. Trading quality for facility is not a legitimate way to improve the GEC. The McHale report has failed to appreciate the increasing importance of foreign language education in the modern world and OSU should reject its suggestions. Change is only beneficial when it actually fixes the problem, not just rearranges it. In the future our university should look to strengthen foreign language study, and not at the cost of other subjects.

Laura M. Herbert is a junior in Spanish and history. She can be reached for comment at [email protected].