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ON CAMPUS
New institute will talk your language
University of Sydney’ s community languages institute gets green light.
By Kirstie Chlopicki
The University of Sydney is set to embark on its newest project – a research institute for community languages education – after it was granted $ 7.6 million in funding from the NSW government.
Dignitaries including NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian, Minister for Finance Victor Dominello and Minister for Multiculturalism Ray Williams made the announcement at the university, which was met with an overwhelmingly positive reaction.
Associate Professor Ken Cruickshank said the funding would make it possible to improve both the number of young people learning languages and the skill levels of language teachers.
“ I think it’ s wonderful. When you realise that only 7.5 per cent of Australian kids do language in the HSC, compared to 50 per cent in the US and the UK, it’ s obvious something has to happen – and this is it,” Cruickshank said.
“ The institute will have three jobs: the scoping of schools to find out what they are doing in language education and what they need, the development of support material for teachers and curriculum for the schools, and an education passport of sorts for language students to accredit their learning.
“ This will help improve language across NSW, but also it’ s cognitive learning – we know that students who learn languages have better critical thinking and problem solving skills; it increases their ability in all subjects and even puts off ageing in the form of memory loss.
“ Our new institute will support linguistic diversity and educational opportunity, through research, teaching and professional learning programs in schools and community organisations in NSW.”
Berejiklian said the new Sydney Institute for Community Languages Education( SICLE) would prioritise research, training and engagement( including designing new syllabuses for 54 languages), scholarships, internships and professional learning courses for volunteer community language teachers.
“ The NSW government is partnering with a world-leading university, and Australia’ s first university, to deliver the
Community Languages Schools Program,” Berejiklian said.
The institute will also design early-entry concessions to encourage secondary students to study languages.
Bonnyrigg Khmer School principal Sorathy Michell said the funding would aid volunteer teachers as well as students.“ It’ s a long time coming, and quite moving for us to see there will be more funding and programs in place for teachers,” she said.
“ Volunteers can feel so isolated in schools because of a lack of funding, but this will help teachers develop new programs and update their skills.
“ It will also give us a guide to assess both teachers and students.”
The school’ s secretary and president of the Australian Council of TESOL Associations, Michael Michell, said he was pleased to see language education moving forward.
“ It’ s a great move for community languages and provides institutionalised support for the sector,” he said.
“ Community languages can be kind of the Cinderella program, but this initiative gives it the status and recognition it deserves, and I couldn’ t think of anyone better to lead it.”
More than 2700 volunteer teachers and almost 35,00 students attend community language schools in NSW, with the University of Sydney the first to provide education for community language teachers in 1975.
Department of Education deputy secretary Georgina Harrisson said she had been working on the concept for a long time and was glad to see it come to fruition with such a positive reaction.
“ We’ ve been working on it for months now and we’ re delighted to be working with the University of Sydney,” she said.
“ The government has a broad plan to increase language studies in NSW, and we’ ve been really keen to locate new ways to improve the uptake of language studies and the professionalisation of community language teachers.
“ We’ ll be focusing on our partnership with the University of Sydney for the next three years, and it will be the first time we’ ve be able to gather data on student progress on this area, which can be used to see what needs to be done.
“ Hopefully the benefits of this will transfer to secondary school and university students,” Harrisson said. ■
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