CRITICAL LANGUAGE SCHOLARSHIPS FOR
INTENSIVE SUMMER INSTITUTES

Sponsored by the United States Department of State, Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs and administered by the Council of American Overseas Research Centers, the Critical Language Scholarships Program was launched in 2006. In its inaugural year, the Program offered intensive overseas study in the critical need foreign languages of Arabic, Bangla/Bengali, Hindi, Punjabi, Turkish and Urdu. In 2007, Chinese, Korean, Persian, and Russian institutes were added along with increased student capacity in the inaugural language institutes.

The Program is part of the National Security Language Initiative (NSLI), a U.S. government interagency effort to expand dramatically the number of Americans studying and mastering critical need foreign languages. Scholarship recipients - U.S. citizen undergraduate, Master's and Ph.D. students and recent graduates - receive funding to participate in beginning, intermediate and advanced level summer language programs at American Overseas Research Centers and affiliated partners. Recipients are expected to continue their language study beyond the scholarship period and later apply their critical language skills in their professional careers.

The 2008 application deadline was January 25, 2008. If you have submitted an application, please log-in to access the supplemental materials forms. Transcript(s) and letters of recommendation should be postmarked by Friday, February 8, 2008.

Eligibility:

• All applicants must be U.S. citizens.
• Applicants must:
  • currently be enrolled in a degree-granting program at the undergraduate or graduate level*, or
  • have graduated from an undergraduate or graduate program no more than 2 years ago (May 2006).
• Current undergraduate students must have completed at least one year of general college course-work by program start date (one year is defined as two semesters or three quarters).
• Please see program details for more information on language pre-requisites for individual institutes.
• Students in all disciplines including business, engineering, science, the social sciences and humanities are encouraged to apply.
• The U.S. Department of State and CAORC welcome all eligible applications and do not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, gender, age, or handicap condition.

*Only graduate students and recent graduates are eligible to apply to the summer 2008 Persian institute.

Grant benefits: All program costs are covered for participants. This includes travel between the student's home city and program location, pre-departure orientation costs, applicable visa fees, room, board, travel within country and all entrance fees for program activities. Note: U.S. passport fees will not be paid by the scholarship.