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I remember standing in the gardens at Harvard's Villa I Tatti in the hills overlooking Florence and thinking "yes, this is what I'm going to do for the rest of my life: study Italy - its language, its culture, and especially the Italian Renaissance." Fortunately, my dream was within reach, and some years later, after several summer institutes, teaching stints, a Fulbright, and the requisite graduate school experience, I emerged with a Ph.D. in Italian Studies. There is no doubt in my mind that the key to just about everything I do, both professionally and personally, is the Italian language. I have always considered myself fortunate to have been a student at Bryn Mawr when I first made the decision to concentrate in Italian because of the prevailing attitude that anything is possible with dedication and hard work. But what if I had wanted to concentrate on Hindi or Hungarian or Wolof?
My own experience and the "what if" question were in mind in 1991 when the Five College Deans asked me, in my capacity as Director of the Center for the Study of World Languages, to develop a program for the Least Commonly Taught Languages. The resulting program, the Five College Supervised Independent Language Program, gives our students the opportunity to make a non-traditional language a central part of their college experience, graduate or professional school plan, or study-abroad focus. In order to enhance access to the languages we offer, we have spent the last 15 years developing target-language and culturally specific materials to supplement standard texts.
We have been awarded significant grants for this development from both private foundations and governmental agencies including: the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Fund for the Improvement of Post-Secondary Education (FIPSE); the National Security Education Program (NSEP), the U.S. Department of Education, the Charles E. Culpeper Foundation, the Booth Ferris Foundation, and the Korea Research Foundation. In 2000, we received an award from the American Council of Education (ACE) for academic excellence and cost-effectiveness in international education. We continue our efforts to expand language access to Five College students and to students nationwide.
Five College Supervised Independent Language Program
Five College Mentored Language Courses
Language and International Opportunities Web
LangMedia: The Five College Foreign Language Media Archive
Five College International and Regional Studies
Five College Language Departments
Language Resources on the Web
© 2002 Five College Center for the Study of World Languages and Five Colleges, Incorporated.
Five Colleges, Incorporated is the consortium of Amherst College, Hampshire College, Mount Holyoke College, Smith College and the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.