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Dr. Sam Eisen is the director of The Language Flagship. Previously, Dr. Eisen served as the Director of the Advanced Training and Research Group in International and Foreign Language Education at the U.S. Department of Education, where he provided oversight for Title VI and Fulbright Hays programming designed to develop and maintain national capacity in foreign language and international and area studies.

The David L. Boren National Security Education Act, as amended, which created the National Flagship Language Initiative, is unique in specifying advanced language proficiency outcomes in U.S. higher education for students of all majors, and also unique in requiring testing to assess proficiency gains.  However, when the legislation for Flagship was written there was no roadmap for how to produce these results consistently in U.S. higher education.  Today The Language Flagship trains undergraduates in a wide variety of majors at 22 institutions of higher education to advanced and superior language proficiency levels in 10 critical languages (Arabic, Chinese, Hindi, Korean, Persian, Portuguese, Russian, Swahili, Turkish and Urdu).  In order to qualify for the Overseas Capstone year, Flagship students must demonstrate ILR 2 proficiency in Speaking and at least one other modality (Reading, Listening or Writing).  This year approximately 150 Flagship undergraduates qualified at the advanced proficiency levels required for participation in the Overseas Capstone program with the goal of achieving ILR 3 proficiency across modalities.¹

The practices that promote advanced proficiency levels are not surprising, but there must be concerted effort to employ the practices consistently.  First and foremost is the expectation of success.  Students must understand that they can achieve working proficiency if they work hard.  Contact hours and maximum exposure to the language are crucial.  Class time must be used efficiently in a learner-centered environment, rich with authentic materials and infused with the goal of eliciting student speech at the sentence and then paragraph level. Intensive language and cultural immersion abroad articulated with the domestic program is an effective component.  Flagship students working from intermediate to advanced levels participate in at least an eight week intensive summer language immersion in approved overseas programs with a language pledge.  On the domestic campus content courses (sheltered, hybrid, or direct instruction in the language) help students to master vocabulary, comprehension, and idiomatic style in humanities, social science or science disciplines.  Connecting advanced proficiency to disciplines and professions outside of the traditional language and literature major helps to increase motivation for a wider variety of students, and also showcases their accomplishments across the institution.  Finally, implementing consistent language proficiency assessment practices is crucial for evaluating student progress and for analyzing areas for program improvement.  Flagship is a dynamic experiment that constantly uses assessment results and peer review to feed back into improving pedagogy, materials and curriculum design.

¹For more information about the Interagency Language Roundtable Language Skill Levels, see this page: http://www.govtilr.org/Skills/ILRscale2.htm