365 Kaplan Hall, UCLA
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1502
In the past five years, over 600 university-level foreign language programs have been closed, while in the five years before that, fewer than ten such programs were closed. In order to demonstrate the value of post-secondary foreign language and culture education, we should reconsider the design of our curricula to more purposefully engage the essential learning outcomes of the liberal arts, as defined by the Association of American Colleges and Universities, in alignment with the World-Readiness Standards for Language Learning. Such a reconceptualization of our curricula would likely increase enrollments and community engagement in the foreign language enterprise both within and beyond our campuses?

Benjamin Rifkin (PhD, University of Michigan) is Professor of Russian and Dean of Arts and Sciences at Hofstra University (NY). He began his academic career at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he directed the Russian language program, and later served as the director of the Middlebury College School of Russian. His publications on the learning and teaching of Slavic languages have appeared in Foreign Language Annals, Modern Language Journal, and Slavic and East European Journal, among other places. He is the co-editor, with Olga Kagan, of The Learning and Teaching of Slavic Languages (Slavica). Rifkin is also the author and co-author of textbooks, including, with Olga Kagan, Advanced Russian Through History (Yale University Press), and, with Evgeny Dengub and Susanna Nazarova, Panorama. Rifkin has served on the boards of directors of the American Council of Teachers of Russian (ACTR), the American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages (AATSEEL), and the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) and has won awards for teaching excellence, scholarship, and service to the profession.

Sponsor(s): Center for World Languages, Department of Slavic, East European & Eurasian Languages & Cultures