Heart is pronounced corazon, not corathson. Empanadas are more filling than tapas. Samba excites more than flamenco. Volcanoes are more thrilling to climb than foothills. Developing countries fascinate more than post-industrial ones.
For many Spanish-speaking Wahoos, Latin America attracts more desire as a study abroad location than Spain. But this University deprives its students in not providing decent opportunities in our own hemisphere. The University must forge partnerships with universities in Latin America to meet the tremendous demand of students.
In the spring semester of 2003, there were 2,047 students taking 85 Spanish classes.Yet, if any of them desire to practice their languages outside of the classroom, their ambitions are stifled.
What's needed? Full immersion. The University should create multiple semester-long programs in Latin America where students can study at a foreign university, take classes with local students, live with local families, be taught by exclusively local professors, forget how to speak English, have all their credits directly transfer back to the University, and avoid gringos (light-skinned foreigners) at all costs. Anything else is study abroad lite.
The Valencia, Spain program may be good, but it is not great. For Wahoos to journey to that distant land and take all their classes in the same building, without any Spanish students, defeats the purpose of studying abroad. In an interview, third-year College student Scott Ohlschlager lamented how last summer in the Valencia program, he did not become friends with a single young Spaniard.Valencia participants do live with local families, but many of these families lack children. Without interacting with local classmates, it is exceedingly difficult to meet non-Americans, blend into the surroundings, and truly live -- not just travel -- amidst another culture.
Until this year, this sole program was inadequate for a large, esteemed school such as ours. Many students are enamored with Latin American cultures, unique dialects of Spanish, distinct history, politics and its non-European flavor. The irony is obvious. Sincethe University lies on the former farm of James Monroe, the first president to formally view Latin America as a place of importance with his Monroe Doctrine, yet there is a dearth of connections between the University and Latin America. Latin America's importance needs to heighten.
It is a glaring absence that the University has not offered one true study abroad opportunity in the entire Western Hemisphere -- our own backyard. Out of the top 10 public schools in the country, the University is the only one to not have a program at where I studied last semester, la Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. This is not just unfortunate but an embarrassment.
Yes, there is a summer program in Peru, but it is a mere foot in the water rather than full immersion. The summer term is an enclave program where American students are grouped together at school, at home, and on group trips.Seeing gringos in South America, they inevitably will not speak Español (Spanish). It is good news that in the fall of 2004 there will be a semester program offered in Lima.However, some classes are taught in English while others are taught by our University's faculty.That's not the essence of studying abroad.Moreover, the seasons are reversed in the southern hemisphere, meaning that Peruvian students take their winter vacations while the gringos study by themselves during the summer term.Besides, one program will not suffice.
In fairness, the University has allowed students to study abroad via third party institutions, as I did myself. But we do not attend an average university. Our University purportedly ranks as the best public university in the land, yet in study abroad opportunities its ranking would dwell in the cellar.External programs are loaded with so much bureaucracy, uncertainty and impersonal communication that many students just do not bother. Direct connections can remedy this formidable impediment to cross-cultural exchanges.
Cost-based objections against additional programs fall flat. Say that 50 Wahoos study abroad in University-run programs in Cordoba, San José and Santiago. That is one, maybe two professor salaries to be devoted instead toward local coordinators. Those students will receive much better instruction particular to Latin America than the meager class offerings here on Grounds.
Idealism notwithstanding, there shall be a realist interest in getting more students off Grounds to explore the world while studying. More students studying abroad alleviates overcrowding. Even with student exchanges, the number of foreign students studying here does not surpass Wahoos studying abroad. A facile solution has appeared.
Having study abroad programs south of the Rio Grande is the only way for the University to even come close enough to smell the 80 percent study abroad participation goal set in the U.Va. 2020 proposal. Beefing up English and French programs will not feed those who refuse to eat the hackneyed European meat.
Our passports yearn for a stamp with the words aeropuerto internacional. By creating study abroad locations in Latin America, the University will allow Wahoos to satisfy their frustrated wanderlust. Not all want to speak with intentional lisps.
(Brandon Possin's column appears Fridays in The Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at bpossin@cavalierdaily.com.)
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