The U.S. Department of State offers a fully funded summer language program called the Critical Language Scholarship Program. This is an intensive, overseas language program, which is seven to ten weeks each summer. It is for undergraduate and graduate students from across the US to study at over 20 sites abroad. CLS is part of a U.S. government effort to dramatically expand the number of Americans studying and mastering foreign languages spoken in places of interest to the U.S. state department Participants are expected to continue their language study beyond the scholarship period, and later apply their critical language skills in their future professional careers.
Students must be U.S. citizens to apply and enrolled in a U.S. undergraduate or graduate program. All candidates must have completed at least their first year of university-level study by the beginning of the summer institute. Students in all disciplines, including business, engineering, sciences, social science, and humanities are encourages to apply. Applications are accepted each fall, September through mid-November, for programs beginning the following summer.
The Critical Language Scholarship Program is designed for U.S. students to learn the following languages:
- Azerbaijani
- Bangla
- Hindi
- Indonesian
- Korean
- Punjabi
- Turkish
- Urdu
- Arabic
- Persian
- Chinese (intermediate and advanced)
- Japanese (intermediate and advanced)
- Russian (intermediate and advanced)
Study takes place in Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Jordan, Morocco, Oman, Russia, South Korea, Tajikistan and Turkey.
U.S. undergraduate students can earn academic credit through this summer institute. In addition, all program costs are covered by the U.S. state department. This program is competitive; students must apply and be accepted by the U.S. Department of State.
Please visit www.clscholarship.org for more information.