Alumni Newsletter
KSU FOCUSES ON RECRUITMENT
The University is focusing on international student recruitment. The number of international students at KSU has increased over the last four years. During the last couple of years the University supported recruitment trips to Asia, the Mid-East, Costa Rica, Paraguay, Colombia, and Mexico.
Jim Lewis, an ELP instructor was the K-State representatives on the recruitment trip to Asia. The tour went to Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand.
The University is in the early stages of planning recruitment activities for the coming year. If you would like to get involved, e-mail us at elp@ksu.edu.
International students improve English skills
Danica Coto
Kansas State Collegian
The student from Finland was upset. Loree Lewandowski, sophomore in psychology, was supposed to take him to the
optometrist so he could buy some contact lenses. But when he looked back, Lewandowski was in her car. "I
saw him talking to himself, and he seemed mad," Lewandowski said. "He looked over, and he thought I
had left him." They both started laughing when they realized that once again, cultural differences had caused
different responses.
People always walk in Finland, and so he is still getting used to how much Americans drive, she said. Lewandowski is in
Introduction to Linguistic Anthropology, where students are paired with a non-English-speaking student from the English
language program. The students usually meet once a week to help the international students improve their English.
"It's one of the nicest things that could happen for our students," Mary Wood, English language program director,
said. "It's very hard when you're speaking a second language to get up the courage and talk to people you don't know. "
This gives our students a nice, safe, warm, friendly situation in which they can approach Americans and practice their speaking
and learn about American culture."
Maria Mateos, a Mexican graduate student in plant pathology, said this program is a good opportunity to learn more. She said
she is taking English classes to improve her listening and writing, and she volunteered in that class to participate in this
program. "I have so many ideas, but I find myself not being abl to communicate them," she said. "It's very hard.
I find myself obligated to learn English faster."
But it's not easy to help them learn English, said Megan Switzer, freshman in speech pathology and student in the linguistics
class. Switzer is paired with a student from South Korea who has started to learn English. "It's hard. You just have to
use your hands a lot," Switzer said. "It's really frustrating when he doesn't understand what you're saying."
Harriet Ottenheimer, professor of anthropology, started this program 10 or 15 years ago. She said she wanted students to
apply concepts they were learning about in her linguistics class. "It's a real, everyday kind of situation," she said. "
They work with a real person who spoke a real language that was different from their own." She said every student in her class
has a different challenge, because those enrolled in the English language program have different skill levels. "Some are
graduate students whose English needs a little polishing, and others came to K-State to learn English," she said.
Wood said students in her program love the project. "One Japanese student had said she was looking at three or four
universities, and she chose K-State because of the program," she said.
Ottenheimer said responses from international students have been positive. So positive, in fact, that American students
have helped them bargain for a car, become their roommates or even get invited to their weddings. "It's a nice opportunity
for them to meet an American student," she said. "It provides them someone, especially if they're a little shy about
meeting people on their own. It provides them a contact person."
But international students aren't the only ones who are learning. In addition to learning about the differences in sound systems
between languages, linguistic students also learn about their partners' backgrounds. "It's hard to understand what the people
are saying, but it's interesting to learn about their culture," Switzer said.
When Lewandowski first met her Finnish partner at Espresso Royale Caffe, he had prepared a folder on Finland for her. "He
speaks four languages," she said. "He actually teaches me a lot."