Chair: Marco Roman
Professor: Susann Samples
Associate Professors:   Diana Rodríguez-Lozano, Charles Merrill, Michael Sollenberger
Assistant Professor: Christine Blackshaw
Lecturers: Roxanne Stefanik, Elaini Tsoukatos

Overview
Study Abroad
Core Proficiency Requirements
Credit for Prior Learning
English as a Second Language
Certificate of Proficiency
International Studies
Secondary Teacher Certification

Overview
The ability to communicate in a foreign language and to demonstrate a substantial understanding of a foreign culture and its literature has ever been the mark of an educated person and is at the heart of higher education. Therefore, the Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures has as its mission the development of linguistic, cultural and literary proficiencies that help students gain an appreciation of social pluralism and cultural diversity.  Our programs provide students with the means to participate directly in foreign cultures and to compare and contrast them with insight and sensitivity.  More specifically, the department’s core offerings and major course programs in French, German, Greek, Italian, Latin, Spanish and classical studies provide students with access to bodies of knowledge that are unavailable to monolingual individuals, thereby positioning them for the increasingly global world in which we live.  Consequently, the department fulfills the university's liberal arts mission to educate by providing students with the necessary communicative skills that enable them as globally educated citizens “to understand and to challenge or embrace the cultural forces operating on them” while at the same time “compassionately engaging with the world.”

The goals of the department’s programs are at once practical and cultural. In learning to communicate, students develop the skills to understand and interpret both written and spoken language.  Moreover, they learn to write and speak in the foreign language about historical, literary and cultural topics of interest to the native speakers of the foreign language as well as the student.  These practical skills permit students to work at jobs in non-English-speaking countries and to work with people in this country who do not speak English. Students improve their creative and analytic skills, strengthen their memory, increase their ability to speak and write in their native language, and generally cultivate their intellects, making them more apt for the apprehension of truth, the overall goal of a college education. 

At the same time students come to understand through their study how foreign languages are inextricably connected to particular civilizations and societies. They learn that communicating in a foreign language means becoming literate in another culture rather than merely learning to decipher a code. Achieving these goals enables students to gain an awareness of and sensitivity to ways of thought and expression not native to them. They become aware of how foreign language is linked to every aspect of culture. They come to understand the social structure, politics, psychology, literature, history, world view, art and religion of other societies. They learn how to live happily as residents of foreign societies and to appreciate foreign travel. As students come to understand cultures that express themselves in other languages, they attain a more complete and accurate understanding of our own society’s religion, art, history and literature, and of its strengths.

Study Abroad
As an important complement to its campus programs, the department encourages its students to study abroad. To facilitate such educational experiences, the department regularly offers summer study abroad programs in San José, Costa Rica; Tours, France; and Seville, Spain.  In each of these programs, study-abroad participants live with host families, attend courses at well-established language institutes, and take courses offered by a Mount foreign language professor.  Such arrangements provide students with the atmosphere that is needed to practice their foreign language skills, gain valuable cultural insights, and make lasting personal relationships. 

In addition, Mount St. Mary’s sponsors a series of semester-long foreign study.  These programs, organized through the Mount’s affiliation with the American Institute for Foreign Study and taught by Mount St. Mary's University faculty, focus on providing students with an interdisciplinary understanding of the country visited. The Florence program, in particular, provides students of Italian with the opportunity to develop their Italian language skills begun at the Mount. 

Finally, the department presents students with the unique chance to enrich their cultural experiences while serving the needs of the community through its culture/service trips to Perú and Mexico.  Not only do these study tours furnish students with additional practice of their language skills in a real-life environment, but they afford students a chance to grow in their understanding of what it means to compassionately engage with the world through a service component. 

Core Proficiency Requirements
All Mount St. Mary’s students must demonstrate proficiency through the first-year college level in the foreign language of their choice by the senior year. Ordinarily, students should meet their foreign language proficiency requirement by the end of their sophomore year.

Foreign language proficiency is first assessed through a placement test given during freshman summer orientation. The test results determine whether students are placed at a 101-102; 201-202; or 300 level of foreign language competence. Those who place at the 201-202 level will have satisfied the college’s proficiency requirement. Students who elect to study a foreign language new to them will be exempt from the placement exam and will start at the 101 level.  Students may also fulfill the foreign language proficiency requirement with a score of 3 or better on an Advanced Placement foreign language exam taken prior to matriculation or by an appropriate score on a CLEP test taken no later than the end of the sophomore year.  

All students are strongly encouraged to elect foreign language study beyond the core requirement, given the increasing national and global need for persons who are proficient in languages. In order to assist students in working toward minoring or majoring in a language of their choice, the university awards students credit for prior learning based on the placement results, which are valid for all four years (see following section).

Credit for Prior Learning in Foreign Language
Students who place at the intermediate (201-202) or advanced (300) level of language study on entering Mount St. Mary’s and who elect to continue study of a language beyond the core requirement will receive credit for their prior learning. Students may receive credits for prior learning for each language in which they place at the intermediate or advanced level. Such credit will be awarded as follows:

• A student who places at the intermediate level and who earns a C or better in a 200-level foreign language course taken at Mount St. Mary’s will receive six credits (three for the course and three for prior learning).

• A student who places at the advanced level and who earns a C or better in a 300- or 400-level foreign language course taken at Mount St. Mary’s will receive nine credits (three for the course and six for prior learning).

Students may receive such credit only if they place at the intermediate level or above at matriculation, and they may receive such credit only once for each language—following the first intermediate or the first advanced foreign language course taken at Mount St. Mary’s. Students who withdraw from their first intermediate or first advanced course in a particular language forfeit the possibility in the future of earning credits for prior learning in that language. Students may not receive credit for prior learning if they have received foreign language credit via the Advanced Placement exam or a course not taken at Mount St. Mary’s. Students receiving credit for prior foreign language learning will not be assessed an additional tuition charge.

English as a Second Language
Mount St. Mary’s requires that students whose native language is other than English must take the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) and score no less than 550 on the exam in order to be admitted to the college. Students who need help in English after enrolling at Mount St. Mary’s should meet with the director of learning services.

Certificate of Proficiency
Upon successful completion (a minimum grade of C) of four 300-level foreign language and culture courses (as listed in the different foreign language programs), students will earn a Certificate of Proficiency in their foreign  language (French, German, or Spanish). 

International Studies
The Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures plays a primary role in both the major and minor in international studies, each of which has an advanced foreign language requirement. (These programs are described in detail elsewhere in this catalog—see the Department of Political Science.) Students majoring in international studies find a major or minor in a foreign language to be a natural complement to their chosen area of study.

Secondary Teacher Certification
The department offers a Secondary Teacher Certification program in French, German, Latin and Spanish. Students complete the requirements in their chosen language major and the designated education courses. This program is subject to the approval of the Maryland State Department of Education.