Foreign Language for National

Security: Let’s Act, Not React

Lorie Roule

The IC requires the utmost capability to meet increasingly complex 

national security threats. Having sufficient foreign language-qualified 

personnel should be the least of its worries. Yet, we face the same 

challenges year after year in meeting foreign language demand. Let’s be 

proactive and reframe our approach. We can create an intentional and 

dynamic foreign language strategy that adapts to new requirements, is 

immune from resource constraints, mandates the skill-set visibility 

needed to optimize talent, and harnesses ever-emerging new technologies 

to supercharge human capabilities. With leaders shining a light on the 

importance of foreign language and everyone—managers and employees

alike—playing a role, the opportunity is ripe for sustainable IC-wide 

culture change that makes foreign language capability a given.

RESEARCH SHORT

What this is:

Research Shorts fuse two 

research cultures, blending 

intelligence information with 

academic insights on topics of 

interest to the IC. Shorts are 

intended to constructively 

start and add to the IC's 

conversations—not to finish 

them. NIU, the sole fully 

TS/SCI-cleared university, 

publishes the Shorts.

What this is not:

Research Shorts are not 

finished intelligence and are 

not IC-coordinated. The 

opinions expressed are solely 

those of the author and do not 

represent those of any U.S. 

Government agency.

CATALYST Designed to spark positive July 27, 2023

conversations on the future of the IC 

IMAGE FROM SHUTTERSTOCK
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When Leon Panetta, a lifelong advocate of the importance of foreign language, became 

Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (DCIA) in 2009, he assumed that we all spoke a 

foreign language—CIA’s was an overseas mission after all. Not quite, we had to tell him. 

Building and sustaining foreign language skills remained a perennial challenge. Panetta 

promptly set a goal for the agency: “Double the number of Agency analysts and collectors who 

are proficient in foreign languages and increase by 50 percent the number of officers with the 

right language skills serving in jobs that require foreign language.”1 As CIA’s Senior Language 

Authority, I was on the receiving end of this rather daunting task.

The CIA had good reason to move out smartly. Whereas our adversaries in the past had been 

well defined, the United States’ global threat matrix had become increasingly complex. We 

were combating global terrorism, tackling transnational weapons proliferation and narcotics, 

all while continuing to monitor trends and events across the globe that could impact U.S. 

national security. All this while we were embroiled in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and 

routinely countering threats from China, Iran, North Korea, Russia, and other nation-states.

Sound familiar? Fast forward to 2023 and our intelligence challenges have only grown in 

complexity and interconnectedness with cyber threats, global pandemic, China’s rapidly 

expanding military capabilities and international presence, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and 

unpredictable and often wild fluctuations in the finance and energy markets added to the mix. 

Wouldn’t we want to have the language skills we need at the ready? 

Yet, we continue to be reactive in our efforts to address the “foreign 

language challenge” in the Intelligence Community (IC) and the nation.

Short-Term Fixes Without Long-Term Result...

We know and have known that we need to do better. A walk through 

the global challenges we have faced in our nation’s history spotlights 

our deficiencies in foreign language capability—most pronounced 

during times of high-stakes need (see Appendix A). In reactive mode, 

we strived to find (often creative) solutions, primarily through 

increasing language study or hiring native speakers, such as the Nisei 

in World War II or the native Arabic speakers during the post-9/11 

years to serve as translators and interpreters.2

These short-term fixes unfortunately did not solve the underlying need 

to build and sustain a broad, crisis-ready multilingual capability in the 

ranks of intelligence and national security personnel. Language training budgets increase only to 

be subject to fluctuation in outyears making it difficult to sustain programs. Hiring and training 

programs focus on certain “critical” languages only to be refocused when a different language 

need emerges, and keeping language instructors gainfully employed when their language is no 

longer in demand becomes its own challenge. Intelligence professionals are managed in a way 

that does not necessarily align with developing and using their language expertise.3

– Sen. Paul Simon, Washington 

Post, Op-Ed, October 2001

“In every national crisis from 

the Cold War through Vietnam, 

Desert Storm, Bosnia and 

Kosovo, our nation has 

lamented its foreign language 

shortfalls. But then the crisis 

‘goes away,’ and we return to 

business as usual. One of the 

messages of September 11 is 

that business as usual is no 

longer an acceptable option.”
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This is not to say that the IC has not made any progress. Some bright spots exist:

• In 1991, Congress established the National Security Education Program (NSEP), 

intended to increase the pool of language-qualified applicants for national security 

positions. Administered by the Department of Defense (DoD), the program provides 

scholarships and fellowships to American undergraduate and graduate students for the 

study of foreign languages critical to U.S. national interest. NSEP awardees are 

expected to fulfill a Federal service requirement upon program completion. As of 2022, 

nearly 4,800 recipients are working in Federally funded positions with nearly 80 

percent of those placements in priority agencies, including DoD and the IC.4

• The National Media Exploitation Center and the National Virtual Translation Center 

were established in 2001 and 2003, respectively, each providing resources to national 

security agencies for the exploitation of foreign language materials.5

• In May 2012, the Director of National Intelligence formalized the establishment of a 

Foreign Language Executive Committee (FLEXCOM) to enable an integrated 

approach to develop, maintain, and improve IC foreign language capabilities. Each 

agency was required to designate a Senior Language Authority to oversee its respective 

foreign language matters and to serve on FLEXCOM.6

• Within K–12 education, programs supporting foreign language proficiency—such as Dual 

Language Immersion, Community Heritage, the Seal of Biliteracy—began to proliferate. 

STARTALK, a Federal grant program funded by the National Security Agency (NSA) and 

established in 2007, provides tuition-free programs in critical languages for K–16 students 

and professional development for teachers of critical need languages, benefiting more than 

84,000 students and teachers.7 The number of foreign language enrollments in higher 

education spiked from 1,138,772 to 1,673,666 between 1995 and 2010, but unfortunately 

those numbers have fallen during the past decade (see Appendix B).

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... In the Face of Perennial Challenges

The challenges that make building and sustaining a language-ready workforce difficult in the 

first place are persistent. Learning another language is hard and it takes time—as much as two 

years for some languages in many U.S. Government programs. Training costs money and 

personnel time and, once acquired, language skills are perishable. Hiring for language is not 

always sufficient because finding and bringing onboard talent with both occupational-related 

qualifications and language proficiency can be difficult. Language requirements change, as any 

language can be important at any time.

Catalyst for Change: A Way Forward for the IC

So, what to do? The catalyst for real change that sticks is to better position ourselves to act—by 

committing to and executing an intentional, comprehensive strategy—and not to react to needs as 

they occur. For inspiration, I point to several key takeaways from my IC experience as CIA’s 
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Senior Language Authority. These are principles that I continue to draw upon even now outside 

of government in my participation in grassroots language advocacy at the national and state levels.

Reframing the Issue: Language Is not an Afterthought, but an Active Thought

As a first step, reframing the issue can serve as the driving force in moving from reactive to 

active. This means changing our thinking about the foreign language challenge as a single issue 

that can be solved to recognizing it requires an ongoing undertaking that reflects the dynamic 

nature of the organization and its mission. This shift moves our mindset from “We need more 

Chinese speakers today” to “We continually invest in having language skills at the ready.” In 

the case of IC agencies, it recognizes that the workforce is ever-changing—new people are 

hired, experienced people leave, and people move from assignment to assignment while 

employed. How much language capability, what percentage is being used, and what percentage 

has degraded at any given time within any given workforce naturally fluctuates. Likewise, 

while some languages are enduring in their utility to mission—Arabic, Chinese, Russian, and 

Spanish come to mind—specific language needs also fluctuate over time as missions change.

Reframing calls for the creation of a foreign language strategy that is in alignment, not conflict, 

with an organization’s overall strategy. It encompasses policies, practices, and programs that work 

in harmony with how an organization manages its talent. Language is not an afterthought, but rather 

an active thought. Such a strategy is woven into how the organization hires, assigns, manages, 

evaluates, and develops its talent. It includes answers to such questions as: How should language 

factor into assignments and promotions? What should be the optimal staff-contractor or civilianmilitary mix for language support? With what frequency should language skills be used? How 

should language skills be sustained when not in use? How, how frequently, and at what level of the 

organization should capability be measured and adjusted against well-defined but changing needs?

Reframing the issue is the underpinning to creating a comprehensive ongoing language 

strategy. The next four key takeaways support implementation of that strategy.

Leading the Way: Leaders Message and Act

What leaders—particularly the senior appointees who lead our intelligence organizations—say and 

do has meaning. Change happens and sticks when leaders say the right things and, importantly, 

back up what they say with actions aligned to the message. Director Panetta not only emphasized 

to the workforce the critical role that foreign language played in the intelligence mission frequently 

and at every opportunity, but he also ensured language programs were appropriately resourced to 

meet his vision. Leaders further have a role in ensuring the continued viability of an organization’s 

language strategy beyond their individual tenures. Leading the way might look like:

• Establishing language readiness as an organizational priority and calling upon 

organizational leaders to report regularly on their language readiness postures.

• Communicating expectations to organizational leaders that language skills within their 

units are to be maintained and used.
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• Messaging the importance of foreign language and the organization’s language goals 

regularly and at all levels.

• Ensuring foreign language training budgets and programs are protected from year to 

year; sufficiently investing to meet current and enduring challenges even while 

planning for unanticipated language needs.

• Empowering the Senior Language Authority to help shape and implement a 

comprehensive foreign language strategy.

• Recognizing and celebrating mission successes attributed to foreign language capability.

Involve Everyone: Managers and Employees Each Play a Role

Responsibility for a multilingual workforce does not rest on the shoulders of leadership alone. 

Managers, supervisors, and employees all play a role to ensure language is woven into daily 

intelligence activities. Managers and supervisors are at the crucial intersection between an 

organization’s leadership and its workforce and thus aptly positioned to set expectations and provide 

opportunities. They should expect their workforce to acquire and maintain language skills and 

provide opportunities—such as time for immersion, study, or formal training—for employees to do 

so. For their part, employees should seek out the language skills they need to do their jobs more 

effectively. Once acquired, they should maintain those skills. Acquiring and maintaining language 

skills need to be approached with the same level of focus and drive as any mission assignment. 

Monetary incentives are used by many organizations and can indeed be useful motivators. We 

should not forget, though, that for some an even stronger motivator is the ability to get the mission 

done because one has the right skill set to do so. Involving everyone might look like:

FOR MANAGERS: FOR EMPLOYEES:

• Postponing deploying personnel until they have 

completed language training or achieved the 

necessary level of language proficiency for the 

assignment.

• Ensuring their workforce maintains their language 

capabilities by setting expectations and providing 

opportunities.

• Supporting their workforce in using their language 

skills to meet other temporary mission needs when 

the situation arises.

• Factoring language skills into permanent or 

temporary assignment selection decisions.

• Setting expectations for personnel working on a 

specific topic, but who might not have a language 

requirement, to acquire some level of language 

competency to better understand their target set.

• Sustaining acquired language skills to be languageready when the need arises.

• Contributing to temporary mission requirements 

involving language skills.

• Mentoring others and seeking mentorship to

improve and sustain their language skills.

• Highlighting for their managers how they used 

their language skills and cultural knowledge on 

the job.
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Ensure Visibility: Visibility Enables Optimization of Capability

Without visibility into the organization’s foreign language capability and the means to track 

changes, it is difficult, if not impossible, for leaders and managers to effectively optimize the 

organization’s talent. How will they know if requirements are being met and where the gaps 

are, how can they keep their senior leaders better informed or advocate for resources, and how 

can they avoid duplication of effort? Unfortunately, we sometimes face a situation in which 

“the right hand does not know what the left hand is doing.” One part of the organization may 

be investing in promoting language study for its workforce, while another has insufficient 

funds to meet a similar need. One part of the organization may be desperately seeking 

capability in a less commonly taught language, while another has excess capacity. “Boutique” 

training efforts, where one office invests to improve its cadre of language-qualified personnel,

within an organization may be fine, but awareness and insight need to reside at a central point 

to optimize limited human and financial resources effectively and equitably. Ensuring visibility 

might look like:

• Empowering the Senior Language Authority to have visibility into all aspects of the 

foreign language mission. (In my view this includes language-enabled, as well as 

language-required positions and people, contractor support, and use of technology.)

• Collecting, visualizing, and analyzing foreign language needs and capability data regularly.

• Creating mechanisms to quickly identify a capability when there is a sudden, emerging 

need, such as temporarily surging existing language talent from elsewhere within an 

organization, resource sharing within the IC, and expediting security clearances for 

new hires with a particular language skill.

• Ensuring managers have access to their foreign language-related data to make informed 

decisions about capability and gaps.

Harness Technology: Effectively Blend Human and Tech

The rapid advances of today’s technology make new things possible. We are well beyond the 

days of “nonsensical machine-translated text” as the go-to image in our minds when we think 

of language technology. Well-established technologies, such as optical character recognition, 

computer-assisted translation, or textual analysis to process mega-quantities of foreign 

language material have transformed the work of translators. Language learning tools—such as 

language labs, use of immersive 360-degree images, multimedia platforms, and learning apps 

that adapt to an individual’s pace of learning—have similarly reshaped the language learning 

classroom (in-person or online) for instructors and learners. Tools that provide automated 

visibility into an organization’s language readiness have better enabled us to get a fuller picture 

and manage an organization’s talent. We are only beginning to imagine what artificial 

intelligence can do for language processing and learning. It is imperative that the IC stay at the 

cutting edge of technology to create the most efficient and effective blend of human cognition 

and technological capability. Effectively harnessing technology might look like:
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• Ensuring translators and interpreters have the latest suite of technology to enhance 

their work.

• Integrating use of language-processing tools, such as natural language processing, in 

language acquisition training itself—much like the introduction of calculators in 

mathematics instruction.

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• Cultivating relationships with the private sector and academia to stay informed on the 

latest technologies.

Why a Foreign Language Strategy Matters

Each of these takeaways gives room for thought as to if and how they may be molded into our 

organizations to achieve a sustainable, multilingual, and multicultural IC. After all, the 

intelligence mission is about human relationships—whether we are monitoring behind the 

scenes to better understand an adversary’s plans and intentions, or actively engaging with allies 

to make the world a safer place. Language serves as a window into those relationships by 

providing insight into how others think and act and the cultures in which they reside. We should 

not be caught short as language needs arise.

Oh, and back to the mandate from then-DCIA Panetta: We did improve our foreign language 

capability posture by adhering to the principles described in this Research Short. That said, 

subsequent ebbs and flows in foreign language capability, especially as it relates to evolving 

mission needs, have only reinforced the importance of committing to a long-term foreign 

language strategy. Let’s act, then, and not wait for the next crisis to react.

Lorie Roule is an advocate for multilingual and multicultural competencies at the national level and in 

her home state of Virginia, as a member of the grassroots language advocacy organization Global 

Virginia. She also serves on the advisory boards of Planet Word Museum, Washington, DC, and 

Reencuentro Taino Conference—the latter dedicated to reviving the Taino (indigenous people of the 

Caribbean) language. During her 35-year career in the IC, Ms. Roule served as CIA’s Senior Language 

Authority (2010–13) and in other foreign language-related positions at both NSA and CIA.

If you have comments, questions, or a suggestion for a Research Short topic or article, please contact 

the NIU Office of Research at Research@niu.odni.gov.
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Appendix A: Past Crises Spotlight the Foreign Language Deficit

Some notable languages that the U.S. Government has found itself struggling to acquire 

quickly at a critical time include:

• In World War II, the U.S. Government lacked Japanese language capability, resulting 

in the recruitment of hundreds of first- and second-generation Japanese Americans to 

translate Japan’s communications (even as others of Japanese descent were forced into 

internment camps for the duration of the war).10

• Russian was the overwhelming language need during the Cold War. Several former 

colleagues and I began our government careers in the 1980s as Russian Voice 

Language Analysts at NSA. Many later transitioned to other missions after the fall of 

the Soviet Union only to see a resurgence in the U.S. Government’s need for Russian 

language proficiency.

• The 1990s witnessed conflict in the Balkans and the ensuing need for the languages of 

the former Yugoslavia, including Serbian, Croatian, and Bosnian. In testimony before 

the House Armed Services Committee in 2000, former Supreme Commander of NATO 

General Wesley Clark stated that “NATO’s actions in the Balkans had generated 

significant language requirements” but that the [U.S.] military not only lacked skills in 

these languages, but was “always going to be short of skilled linguists.”11 The solution 

was to hire contract linguists, but even companies were finding it hard to find qualified 

language personnel who met the requirements.

• Similarly, the 9/11 Intelligence Commission report, published in December 2002,

lamented that “The language problem has been one of the Intelligence Community’s 

perennial shortfalls. Prior to September 11, the shortage of language specialists who 

would be qualified to process large amounts of foreign language data in general, and 

Arabic in particular, was one of the most serious issues limiting the Intelligence 

Community’s ability to analyze, discern, and report on terrorist activities in a timely 

fashion.”12 Yet, the 10-year period following the 9/11 attacks saw continued shortages 

in Middle Eastern and South Asian language skills among the various agencies. As an 

example of media reports criticizing the lack of Arabic, Pashto, and Dari language 

capability, the Washington Post noted, in October 2006, that five years after 9/11, only 

33 FBI agents, none of whom worked on international terrorism, had even limited 

proficiency in Arabic;13 the CIA and other IC agencies faced the same challenge. 

Similarly, a 2011 Reuters article reported that U.S. “spy agencies” were still lacking in 

language skills “despite intense focus on Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the Middle East 

in the last decade.”14

• Chinese, Persian, and Korean—long in the mix of language needs—have moved to the 

forefront, as the national security focus has turned toward China, Iran, and North Korea

in more recent years. Likewise, the need for less commonly taught languages 
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periodically emerges, with the IC searching for the rare Burmese or Hausa speaker in 

its ranks when violence erupts in Myanmar or West and Central Africa.

The Modern Language Association has tracked data on languages studied in higher education 

and found that international and domestic developments influence which languages are studied 

by university students. Increased study of a particular “critical” language, however, has often 

come after the crisis at hand. A February 2017 study by the American Academy of Arts and 

Sciences, America’s Languages: Investing in Language Education for the 21st Century, makes 

this very point: “The United States has only focused on language education in times of great need, 

such as encouraging Russian studies during the Cold War or instruction in certain Middle Eastern 

languages after the terrorist attacks of 2001. At such moments, enrollments increase dramatically, 

but students require years of training before they can achieve a useful level of proficiency, often 

long after the immediate crisis has faded and national priorities have changed.”15
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Appendix B: Building Foreign Language Capacity in U.S. Schools

The K–16 language pipeline is worth a special mention. Building capacity in the numbers of 

those studying and teaching foreign languages will have a direct, positive impact upon the 

ability of the IC to hire for language skills. This was the impetus behind STARTALK and the 

various NSEP programs, including the Boren Scholarships and Fellowships for undergraduate 

and graduate students, Language Flagship grants to U.S. institutions of higher education, and 

English for Heritage Language Speaker scholarships.

Unfortunately, language study in the United States is bleak. Only 20 percent of K–12 students 

study a foreign language16 and the trend for enrollments at the undergraduate and graduate 

levels for languages other than English is declining. Total enrollments dropped by 9.2 percent

between fall 2013 and fall 2016, according to the Modern Language Association, and its sample 

survey of programs between 2016 and 2020 showed an even greater drop of 15.4 percent—

albeit the pandemic may have had some impact.17 Programs are also on the decline. The total 

number of language programs offered in fall 2016 was down by 651, or 5.3 percent, since 2013,

contrasted with a drop of only one language program between 2009 and 2013.18 And the 

downward trend for language students is exacerbated by the continued shortage of foreign 

language teachers. In the 2017–18 academic year, at least 49 of 56 U.S. states and territories 

experienced shortages in teachers qualified to teach world languages and bilingual education. 

These shortages are only projected to grow; by 2025, we could witness a hiring gap of 100,000 

teachers annually.19

Increasing foreign language capacity in our country should be a concern for all of us not only for 

national security reasons, but also for our country’s economic prosperity. Language matters for 

many reasons: economic vitality and competitiveness, the success of our children as global 

citizens, the many cognitive benefits it provides, and for reasons of social justice. The good news 

is that we all have within our power the ability to advocate from where we are. Taking action can 

range from emphasizing the importance of foreign language skills and global citizenship with 

young people in our own personal networks, to partnering with educators and school boards to 

preserve and support foreign language programs, to enlisting private-sector participation in 

valuing and hiring for language to expand business opportunities, to making our voices heard 

with local, state, and national legislators, to refreshing our personal language skills or learning a 

new language for the first time. Even one small action can lead to lasting change.
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Endnotes

1 “CIA Director Leon E. Panetta To Host Foreign Language Summit,” CETRA Admin (blog), CETRA Language 

Solutions, December 3, 2010, https://www.cetra.com/blog/cia-director-leon-e-panetta-to-host-foreign-languagesummit/.

2 Kelli Nakamura, “Military Intelligence Service Language School,” Densho Encyclopedia, accessed May 9, 2023, 

https://encyclopedia.densho.org/Military_Intelligence_Service_Language_School/. (Translators and interpreters—

many of whom are industry contractors—are invaluable to the IC’s mission, complementing language-capable 

operators and analysts and enabling greater breadth and depth of language capability.)

3 U.S. Congress, Senate, Committee on Governmental Affairs, International Relations, Proliferation, and Federal 

Services Subcommittee, Hearings on the State of Foreign Language Capabilities in National Security and the 

Federal Government, 106th Congress, 2nd session, September 14 and 19, 2000, Senate Hearing, 106–801, 

https://irp.fas.org/congress/2000_hr/hr_091400.html. (Statement by Ruth Whiteside, Deputy Director, National 

Foreign Affairs Training Center, Department of State, regarding foreign language training budget cuts, albeit dated, 

is still true. The Research Short author and her colleagues often experienced budget fluctuations.)

4 National Security Education Program, 2022 National Security Education Program Report (Washington, D.C.: 

Defense Language and National Security Education Office, 2022), 3, 

https://dlnseo.org/sites/default/files/2022%20NSEP%20Annual%20Report.pdf.

5 Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), Intelligence Community Directive (ICD) 302, Document 

and Media Exploitation, July 6, 2007, https://www.dni.gov/files/documents/ICD/ICD_302.pdf (The National 

Media Exploitation Center was operational as of 2001, preceding the ODNI’s 2007 ICD.); Joy Miller, “National 

Virtual Translation Center” (PowerPoint presentation, Interagency Language Roundtable, Plenary Session, 

Washington, DC, June 10, 2011), slide 2, https://govtilr.org/Publications/JuneILR11.pdf.

6 ODNI, ICD 630, Intelligence Community Foreign Language Capability, May 14, 2012, 

https://www.dni.gov/files/documents/ICD/ICD_630.pdf. (In practice, FLEXCOM had been meeting for several 

years before the ODNI’s 2012 ICD was signed.)

7 “The History of STARTALK at the NFLC,” National Foreign Language Center, University of Maryland, accessed 

May 9, 2023, https://nflc.umd.edu/projects/startalk.

8 Dennis Looney and Natalia Lusin, “Enrollments in Languages Other than English in United States Institutions of 

Higher Education, Summer 2016 and Fall 2016: Final Report,” Modern Language Association of America, 2019,

https://www.mla.org/content/download/110154/file/2016-Enrollments-Final-Report.pdf.

9 Chaz Daly and Lorie Roule, “The Great Eight: A Modular Framework To Increase On-the-Job Productivity of Future 

Language Learners” (Presentation, Interagency Language Roundtable, Virtual LEARN Workshop, February 22, 2021).

(Technology must be applied smartly, recognizing its strengths, but also its weaknesses—high-level language skills and 

skills in some of the less commonly taught languages absolutely require the human element.)

10 Nakamura, “Military Intelligence Service Language School.”

11 U.S. Congress, Senate Committee, Hearings on the State of Foreign Language Capabilities. (Gen. Wesley Clark 

quote is provided in “Prepared Opening Statement of Senator Voinovich,” September 14, 2000.)

12 U.S. Congress, Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, 

Report of the Joint Inquiry into Intelligence Community Activities Before and After the Terrorist Attacks of 

September 11, 2001, 107th Congress, 2nd session, December 2002, Senate Report No. 107–351, House Report No. 

107–792, 70, https://www.intelligence.senate.gov/sites/default/files/documents/CRPT-107srpt351-5.pdf.

13 Dan Eggen, “FBI Agents Still Lacking Arabic Skills; 33 of 12,000 Have Some Proficiency,” Washington Post, 

October 11, 2006, https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2006/10/11/fbi-agents-still-lacking-arabicskills-span-classbankhead33-of-12000-have-some-proficiencyspan/ef10018e-6224-4b0f-bffe-ab6d67f6ba15/.

14 Tabassum Zakaria, “U.S. Spy Agencies Struggle with Post-9/11 Languages,” Reuters, September 19, 2011, 

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-intelligence-language/u-s-spy-agencies-struggle-with-post-9-11-languagesidUSTRE78I4P820110919.

15 Commission on Language Learning, America’s Languages: Investing in Language Education for the 21st Century

(Cambridge, MA: American Academy of Arts & Sciences, 2017), 42.

16 American Councils for International Education, The National K–12 Foreign Language Enrollment Survey Report,

June 2017, https://www.americancouncils.org/sites/default/files/FLE-report-June17.pdf.
12

17 Looney and Lusin, “Enrollments in Languages Other than English.”

18 “Snapshot: Language Study in Fall 2020,” MLA Newsletter, 54, no. 3 (Fall 2022): 6–7, 

https://www.mla.org/content/download/190729/file/NL_54-3_web.pdf.

19 “The Teacher Shortage Challenge Is Real,” American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages, accessed 

June 30, 2023, https://www.actfl.org/career-development/educators-rising.