Arabic Video: Why Middlebury Language Schools—Arabic
Why Middlebury Language Schools—Arabic
Watch to see a day in the life of students in the Arabic School! Our application opens on November 1 for the 8-week immersion and graduate programs in Arabic.
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Sushant Naidu:
My name is Sushant Naidu and I am 40 years old and I started at Middlebury with the Arabic Level 1 program, the 8-week intensive. I work in conflict in Yemen for the Center of Peace and Conflict Studies, so I needed another language to work in order to work in the local context. So, I was at the Bennington Campus which is really beautiful and surpassed my expectations, by far, at times I was like…wait, where am I, it was so calm and peaceful.
The Pledge for beginners is a little modified, so basically for the first two weeks you have room to speak in English and to ask questions specifically related to grammar, but its in like the third week that it really goes into like full affect. I think one of the specialties of the program is the learning through activities and you know clubs, so we have like the cooking club and the calligraphy clubs. Various activities also including like volleyball and football [soccer]. I tried out the Quran Club but then finally settled on the Cinema club, for me that was a really great experience.
The strengths of the program is first, I would say, is the immersion. The second thing I would say is the professors, the dedication of the teachers was amazing, and then finally I would say the students themselves, because I feel, at least in my cohort, everyone was really dedicated and wanting to learn the language. I mean it is pretty magical, yea, it is, just like if you just look at it and you go into a language not knowing it at all, but I came out of it writing like a three page essay, giving two presentation and you know, being able to have like a solid conversation with my professors, so in that sense, yea, I would say its pretty magical.
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