Ivory Tower of Babel

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

An old joke goes, “If a person who speaks two languages is bilingual, and a person who speaks three languages is trilingual, what do you call a person who speaks one language? . . . An American.” Almost 80% of Americans speak only English; by contrast, just 25% of adults in the European Union are monolingual.2 The people of the United States can get away with it because they speak the most common language in the world: 1.1 billion of the 1.5 billion English speakers worldwide have learned English as a second language.3 American college graduates should match this level of education by knowing how to communicate in at least one language other than English.

It is a dubious distinction that American society, which sets cultural standards for much of the world, stands out for its monolingualism. “For the first time in over a thousand years,” historian Jacques Barzun said in 2000, the “educated class is not expected to be at least bilingual.”4 Yet never have Americans received so many college degrees.

It did not use to be so. As Appendix A of this report shows, foreign language study was emphasized in American higher education from the beginning. The first Americans imbued the pursuit of wisdom and scientific knowledge with a pragmatic spirit that included proficiency in foreign tongues. In the colonial period, colleges required all students to read ancient-language texts in accordance with the Renaissance humanist and Protestant Reformation traditions. The Founders recognized the basic need for language study, while espousing varied views of how best to implement it. James Madison, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson read widely in Greek and Latin to educate themselves in statecraft and science, while Benjamin Franklin favored modern languages alone. Franklin’s preference continues today in the popularity of Spanish or Chinese over ancient languages. Moreover, since the War of Independence, statesmen’s command of foreign languages has continuously proven vital to American foreign affairs, from our first diplomats negotiating France’s support of the Revolution to critical-need language training in the Second World War, the Cold
War, and the War on Terror.

Today, the many benefits Americans would derive from deeper language education include:

• Citizens with foreign language proficiency provide essential information for the U.S. intelligence service, military, and diplomatic corps. Despite this need, a 2020 report by the Council on Foreign Relations showed that 15% of language-designated positions overseas are vacant, and 24% are filled by officers with insufficient language training.
• Job postings for multilingual employees offer 19% more compensation than job postings for monolingual employees; Indeed.com lists “translation” as the fifth most in-demand job skill; and one out of four U.S. employers reports losing business because of lack of language skills on staff.
• Cognitive science research shows that learning another language improves the ability to comprehend other perspectives, tolerate ambiguity, and understand cultures different from one’s own.
• Language learning sharpens executive function and logical decision-making, improves test performance, and enhances creative thinking. Some studies suggest that language learning can slow the progress of dementia.

In spite of these benefits, the American Council of Trustees and Alumni’s (ACTA) research shows that language study at U.S. colleges and universities is in trouble, even as “global competence” and “diversity” have become key objectives at many institutions.

• Language enrollments have declined 59% over 51 years and dropped 17% from 2016 to 2021 alone.
• In 2011, the federal government cut 40% of the Department of Educations’ international programs and
  language studies budgets, and the situation is much worse as of 2025.
• Language departments are usually the first to suffer in a college’s financial bind. Six out of seven Ohio schools issuing academic cuts in 2024 downsized or eliminated language programs. West Virginia University eliminated all world languages majors and graduate programs in 2023.
• Only 11% of institutions require foreign language study at an intermediate or higher level.
• College-level language preparation is particularly important, given that only 11 states have foreign language high school graduation requirements

Despite this dark picture, leaders in academia have options, which we outline in this report:

• When universities eliminate departments or majors, they often direct those students to a partner institution. Universities can plan out this option, instead of using it as a last-ditch effort, by joining consortia, course-sharing, and other partnerships to expand language learning offerings while reducing costs.
• ACTA has built a Map of Foreign Language Program Graduates showing opportunities for course-sharing and program-sharing among universities.
• Narrowing the number of qualifying courses in general education programs, which often reaches or surpasses 1,000 offerings, would improve university budgets and language course enrollment.
• Colleges may require at least intermediate-level language formation in their general education programs, the minimum for meaningful exchanges between people.
• Institutions that have a global competency requirement or have started a new Western Civilization program may be persuaded to include language study in the curriculum.
• Institutions with budgetary concerns may explore funding from the federal government and private foundations.
• Schools that assess all language students with objective external measures such as the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Language’s (ACTFL) Oral Proficiency Interview, which draws upon standards set by the Department of Defense, give their students a competitive advantage in the job market.

The personal, cognitive, and professional benefits to individual students, not to mention the benefits to our nation, should compel colleges and universities to restore foreign language study to its former place at the center of the curriculum. ACTA urges universities to defend the value and practicability of language education for a free society. Universities claiming to be liberal arts institutions must offer robust language programs to benefit campus and country.

Read the full report HERE.