Since the 1980s, universities throughout the country have integrated Cultures and Languages Across the Curriculum (CLAC) programs into their wider undergraduate curricula in order to foster international literacy and intercultural competence skills for domestic students and to empower international students to use their cultural and linguistic knowledge from their countries of origin.
Suronda Gonzalez public talk “Engaging International Students with CLAC”
Tuesday, April 10, 5–6:30 p.m.
Eaton Humanities, room 1B80
General faculty workshop CLAC Your Curriculum With Dr. Suronda Gonzalez
Wednesday, April 11, 10–11:30 a.m.
Center for Asian Studies
CU Boulder’s Center for Asian Studies (CAS) is celebrating CLAC Week on campus April 10–13.
CLAC Week guest
Programming begins Tuesday, April 10, with the arrival of Suronda Gonzalez from the University of Rochester. Gonzalez will be meeting and consulting with current CU faculty, students and staff associated with CLAC and will offer a keynote address titled “Engaging International Students with CLAC,” free and open to the public. On Wednesday, she will conduct a CLAC general faculty workshop designed for faculty who teach about Asia or want to use Asian languages in their courses. Email cas@colorado.edu to register for the faculty workshop.
Suronda Gonzalez
She also will attend the annual CLAC Conference Thursday, April 12, through Saturday, April 14, at the University of Denver, where CU faculty and students involved in CAS’ CLAC pilot project will present on two panels.
Gonzalez spent 15 years as director of Binghamton University’s nationally acclaimed Languages across the Curriculum Program. In the role, she worked with Binghamton’s faculty and led pedagogical training seminars to support the internationalization of the curriculum. Her work focused heavily on integrating international elements of students’ undergraduate experiences (including language and study abroad) into their studies in meaningful ways.
CLAC at CU
Through a CLAC pilot program this academic year, CAS hired a CLAC coordinator and created one-credit CLAC courses linked to Asian languages and civilizations, religious studies and history. In these CLAC classes, undergraduate students have met weekly with student facilitators and professors to study foreign texts in translation or in the original in order to enhance their studies in linked parent courses through exposure to additional background and supporting materials.
For more information on the CAS pilot program or integrating CLAC into your classes, contact Danielle Rocheleau Salaz, executive director of the Center for Asian Studies, at salaz@colorado.edu.
