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posted by martyb on Thursday February 07 2019, @12:25AM   Printer-friendly
from the Es-ist-mir-ganz-egal dept.

Phys.org:

Of all the skills that a person could have in today's globalized world, few serve individuals – and the larger society – as well as knowing how to speak another language.

People who speak another language score higher on tests and think more creatively, have access to a wider variety of jobs, and can more fully enjoy and participate in other cultures or converse with people from diverse backgrounds.

Knowledge of foreign languages is also vital to America's national security and diplomacy. Yet, according to the U.S Government Accountability Office, nearly one in four Foreign Service officers do not meet the language proficiency requirements that they should meet to do their jobs.

Despite all these reasons to learn a foreign language, there has been a steep decline in foreign language instruction in America's colleges and universities. Researchers at the Modern Language Association recently found that colleges lost 651 foreign language programs from 2013 to 2016

The advice to learn foreign languages has been repeated for decades, but how much does it really help native speakers of English, professionally, to learn other languages? Additionally, does the decline of language courses at traditional schools reflect cheaper, better alternatives online?


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  • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday February 07 2019, @01:43PM

    by JoeMerchant (3937) on Thursday February 07 2019, @01:43PM (#797750)

    Hey, lay off the calculus - I've been working as an electrical/mechanical/software engineer for 28 years now, and I've used calculus for at least 60 hours in those 28 years - that's 0.107% of my working life, you insensitive clod. Now, grant you, 40 of those 60 hours were centered around crazy-ass inventor BS that ended up having almost zero real-world value, but I had a sponsor who was paying me to make this stuff up and it was some serious fun - people were really impressed that I could balance irregular offset spinning masses in 3D.

    BTW, the other 99.893% has been over half politics and social skills, and I pretty actively avoid those things, but they have a way of finding you no matter where you hide. Travel and cultural experience are excellent foundations for developing social skills in a diverse workplace.

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