Glossy brochure covers and brightly colored websites promise summers filled with delicious exotic food, new friends from around the world and fluency in a foreign language.
Foreign language immersion programs provide opportunities for students to gain proficiency in a second language by visiting a country where the language is spoken. Several students participated in these programs in the hopes of improving their foreign language skills.
Senior Daniella Hubert spent nine months in Zaragoza, Spain, last year. She stayed with a host family, attended a local school and spoke Spanish at all times.
“I became pretty fluent,” Hubert said. “The year really increased my language and writing skills because I was immersed with more diverse people.”
Alhough Hubert spent almost a year in Spain, students who attend shorter language programs also report beneficial results. Sophomore Robbie Gill spent seven weeks in Russia the summer before his sophomore year as part of the National Security Language Initiative for Youth program.
“It was pretty intensive,” Gill said. “We only used English when we absolutely had to.”
Gill was able to take Russian 2 after participating in the summer program despite having no prior Russian experience. Many students like Gill who travel abroad jump to the next language level during the school year.
“Some students are very prepared to skip a level,” foreign language department head Pamela Garcia said. “In two weeks, students come back understanding, but it takes six weeks for them to really be able to communicate.”
Sophomore Evan Cernea studied in France for four weeks the summer before his freshman year with the LINES program. He credits his experience with helping him jump from French 2 to French 4 seamlessly.
Students in immersion programs make friends from all around the world. Gill, who lived with a host family in Russia, found that he was able to connect with them fairly easily, despite his initial trouble with Russian.
Though they improve language skills and provide an opportunity to build international friendships, summer language programs still have shortcomings. Language immersion programs often don’t make cultural literacy a priority, students said. Sophomore Rachel Baron, who also attended the LINES program in France, felt that she didn’t gain a true understanding of the French culture.
“We didn’t interact with native French people,” Baron said. “I think that I spoke English about 75 percent of the time.”
Cernea, who stayed in a dorm in a suburb of Paris, visited Paris twice a week but said the activities they did were typical of an American tourist in Paris, such as visiting the Eiffel Tower and the Arc de Triomphe.
Ultimately, language immersion programs help students become comfortable with the language, though they often don’t make culture a priority, students said.
“Before the trip, I only knew a few basic words and how to read and write in Cyrillic,” Gill said. “But after the trip, I could talk proficiently.”
