Language Teaching in the Federal Government: A Personal Perspective

Historically, communication between foreign-lang schools in the federal government & academic foreign-lang programs has been extremely limited. Typical government & academic programs are compared on the eleven significant program characteristics of instructional goals, student characteristics, class size, curriculum, instructional staff, assessment criteria, program length, skill modalities emphasized, instructional methodology, results attained, & supporting empirical research. This series of comparisons reveals a striking contrast in instructional objectives & procedures that has served to reduce cooperation between government & academic foreign-lang programs. It is argued, however, that these significant differences should be viewed as complementary, rather than divisive. The combined assets of both foreign-lang teaching communities provide previously untapped resources for empirical research into national foreign-lang issues. Options are described for cooperative research ventures to address these issues. HA