At first glance, offering popular language courses such as French, German and Spanish online may sound like just another desperate attempt to cut back on expenses.
But executive committee chairwoman of the UNC Faculty Assembly Sandie Gravett, who works closely with the UNC Foreign Language Assembly, said the move to online courses is about “enhancing language instruction throughout the UNC system,” not finding another way to save money.
For this plan to truly enhance language courses, UNC’s Foreign Language Assembly needs to tread carefully. Without the intimate environment a classroom can provide, students can be deprived of the benefits that come with being able to practice a new language face-to-face with their professor or the classmate beside them.
Offering language classes online is by no means new — UNC already offers introductory Spanish courses entirely online. But streamlining online courses through the UNC system is an innovative and efficient idea. And upper-level language courses, which might not have had enough enrollment otherwise, can be offered because students can sign up across several different campuses.
This model of sharing courses between campuses has been successful in the past — schools like N.C. State University and UNC-Wilmington have applied this model to develop new majors.
In some language courses, a synchronous environment is made possible by video in each classroom, which provides some level of interaction between students and the instructor.
But moving courses online cannot wholly emulate crucial aspects of instruction needed for professors to properly teach a language.
Learning a language depends heavily on verbal practice, especially in conversation with other speakers. Without the environment of a true classroom, it becomes harder to grasp integral parts of the language, like accents and proper pronunciation.
The question of protecting intellectual property could also arise as lectures and other learning materials move online.
