American Language Program Funding Shrinks

Columbia’s American Language Program—an English-language school distinguished both by its worldwide prestige and its reliance on international enrollments—is feeling the crunch from the downfall of foreign markets, as shown by a 40 percent decrease in its majority South Korean constituency and an urgency to target growing economies elsewhere.

As the University attempts to weather the recession by assessing finances across the board, the ALP thinks in terms of nationality rather than socioeconomic status. The program, which provides English language instruction for varied purposes and proficiency levels and serves both Columbia students and students not enrolled at the University, has in past years helped to bridge the linguistic gap for one quarter of the foreign students entering what the Institute of International Education ranks as the United States’ third most international university.

“Economic changes and fluctuations in currency rates have had a significant impact on Asian clientele,” said Peter Awn, dean of the School of General Studies, who is temporarily in charge of the School of Continuing Education. Last fall, Awn brought the once-independent ALP under the auspices of Continuing Education.

Established in 1911, the program lacks a tenure system or departmental status, but has over time managed to expand its offerings and reach out to other branches of the University. Current study options range from four weeks of intensive English to upper-tier courses intended to boost communication skills in a chosen discipline. The School of International and Public Affairs, General Studies, the School of Engineering and Applied Science, and the School of Business, among others, regularly place students in the ALP.

Statistics made available by Continuing Education reveal a 24 percent drop in ALP matriculation between the 2007-2008 academic year and the current one, with enrollments from the top 15 countries of origin slipping from 1,607 to 1,208. While countries such as France, Italy, and Spain are sending more students than before, mixed economic conditions in the countries that send the most students—South Korea, Taiwan, Japan, and China—contributed dramatically to the slump.

“It’s considerably more expensive to come to the U.S. now than it was five years ago,” Awn said.

Academic director David Quinn said he views the enrollment downturn as an opportunity to spread awareness of the program in less represented regions of the world. Citing Columbia’s parallel efforts to construct small research offices overseas, Quinn said he hopes to use the ALP as a means of increasing enrollment from Latin America and Europe. And despite this year’s decline of nearly 30 percent in Chinese students in the program, he and Awn predicted increases over the summer from what Awn called a “still robust” economy in China.

“This program always recovers,” Quinn said. Unlike other Columbia schools, the ALP’s success remains entirely subject to external forces, though it survived the 1992 devaluation of the Japanese yen, a severe monetary crisis in Korea in 1997, and a lull following the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

Awn maintained that the program’s “financial processes are up to University standards” and that “we planned for this.”
Whether a strong connection exists between patterns affecting the ALP and developments in Columbia’s recognizable international communities is inconclusive, but the data reflects a telling correlation between the foreign student population at each school of the University and the percentage of ALP students hailing from each school.

According to a 2008-2009 report from the Office of the Provost, the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences drew the most foreigners in 2008, a statistic mirrored by attendance data from the ALP. These similarities suggest that the current dearth in the language program speaks to diminishing numbers of international students within the rest of the University.

In spite of its fame for training in English as a second language, the ALP’s distinct financial difficulties relate to its status as a historically autonomous entity. For years, it was recognized as quasi-independent without strings attached to a particular school, so the program was deprived access to central resources such as student affairs and registration. Lecturers—whose job title emphasizes a traditionally pedagogical role—often had to tend to necessary staff work such as registration, admissions, scheduling, and advising.

“We had so many people [students in the program], our efforts were somewhat diluted,” Quinn said of the effect of these responsibilities on instruction.

As part of Awn’s broader initiative to consolidate Continuing Education, all administrative responsibilities in the ALP have now shifted to external offices, like Student Affairs and the Registrar.

“The ALP will now be a more diversified creature, spearheading a series of programs that will attract better and brighter students,” Awn said. In the works are a college preparatory program and courses for lawyers and businesspeople.

But as the ALP moves forward in a risky financial climate, a slew of other qualitative issues persist.

“The core of the faculty is delighted,” Awn said, but “you cannot make a dramatic change without some people being nostalgic.”

scott.levi@columbiaspectator.com