Goal

Consolidate and expand major and minor programs in critical languages by providing a full-fledged, competitive, undergraduate curriculum for student success.

Strategy 1

Restore core faculty structure and enhance curriculum offering to make ASLL competitive among peer institutions for undergraduate education. 

Critical Tasks:

• Addresses the gaps in faculty structure (Chinese, Korean, Russian, and South Asian Programs) to stabilize faculty structure and undergraduate course offering.
• Revise existing curriculum to ensure that our curriculum meets students' needs and reflects the vision of the major/minor programs and the UI general education.

Action Items:

• Increase regular faculty members by reducing visitor positions;
  Actively seek external funds to support new faculty lines.
• Assess and adjust the current major/minor course offering based on Needs Analysis.

Indicator of Success:

• Increased number of major and GE courses in all areas;
  Increased student enrollment in both language and nonlanguage courses
• Course offering that meets student interests and their career goals; 
• Undergraduate curriculum competitive with peer institutions;

Strategy 2

Strengthen existing major and minor curricula for students to acquire skills and knowledge, to develop cultural and linguistic competency, and to explore professional domains related to their specific area of interest.

Critical Tasks:

• Enhance the upper-level Chinese language curriculum. (Note: Due to the loss of two T-T lines in modern and premodern literature/culture, the upper-level content area courses required for Chinese major/minor are not offered regularly.)
• Enhance current Korean language and area studies curriculum; create a new major in Korean.
• Strengthen the Russian language and upper-level area studies curriculum.
• Resume Hindi language offering. (Note: Due to the retirement of two senior faculty in South Asia, the Hindi language offering is suspended. India is a major country in Asia and in the world, and the significance of offering Hindi language courses cannot be underestimated. UI is the only university in Iowa offering this language. Continuing this critical language offering will keep the UI on the national map of universities with South Asian studies.)

Action Items:

• Convert the two visitor positions to regular instructional faculty lines when funding is available.
• Complete the T-T line search in Korean, and offer needed upper-level content areas courses for the Korean study major/minor;
  Add a new Korean lecturer position to meet the current language course offering demand; develop a curriculum plan for the Korean major (the Korean minor is already in place);
  Continue collaborating with other Big Ten Universities to offer more variety of courses in Korean studies.
• Create a new Russian instructional position to resolve instructional faculty's extremely overloaded issue, meet the demand of existing language courses, and develop more courses focusing on Russian studies for the Russian major/minor.
• Resume this critical language offering by actively seeking internal and external funds in next five years.

Indicators of Success:

• Placement and regular offering of all levels of language courses needed by undergraduate students.
• Needed courses for Korean major/minor will be in place.
• Increased enrollment in Russian GE world language and Russian Major/minor programs.
• The South Asian Program will be restored; students will have opportunities to learn Hindi and other South Asian languages.

Strategy 3

Engage in fundraising and establish more scholarships for each academic program to enable undergraduate learning's greater success.

Critical Tasks:

• Establish scholarships for each academic program to support students' critical language learning and area studies. Our goal is to raise $10,000 funds for each program in next five years.
• Create more opportunities for students to learn about respective culture through cultural activities and events. 

Action Items:

• Work closely with UI Center for Advancement to identify and approach potential donors.
• Develop strategies for each program to engage in fundraising.
• Organize cross-cultural events in cooperation with the UI Center for Asian and Pacific Studies (CAPS) focusing on Asia to provide a broader cultural context for our students and local communities.

Indicators of Success:

• Increased scholarships for each program.
• Secured funding for all programs to run cultural activities.
• Offer multifaceted cultural events for UI and Iowa communities regularly.

Goal

Advance research in literature, culture, second language acquisition, and applied linguistics by making impactful contributions to the respective fields.

Strategy 1

Encourage faculty members' research relating to their interest areas.

Critical Tasks:

• Seek external institutional grants that support critical language education and research.
• Encourage faculty members to seek individual funding opportunities for literary authorship, scholarly research, and professional development.
• Create peer mentoring opportunities for professional development.

Action Items:

• The Department has planned to join CAPS, IP for actively seeking external grants, including US Department of Education grants that support research in language acquisition and areas studies, new faculty lines, and scholarships for graduate programs;
• The Department creates opportunities for faculty members to share grant/award information and support faculty members to submit grant/award applications if applicable.
• Establish departmental research clubs to regularly share research ideas, peer critiques, and publication experiences.

Indicators of Success:

• The expected date for submitting institutional grant applications: Spring 2022.
• Increased number of faculty submitting grant/award applications.
• The Research Club is formed and running.

Strategy 2

Create collaborative opportunities with UI Humanities departments and colleges within the university, and academic units in the US and beyond for research projects to raise national/international visibility of the Department.

Critical Tasks:

• Sponsor international conferences and Symposia to provide platforms for scholarly exchanges.
• Emphasize faculty collaboration in research on topics of common interests.

Action Items:

• Continue with biennial international Conferences in Chinese Applied linguistics.
• Host biennial "Central Association of Teachers of Japanese" conference.  
• Encourage participation in IWP and Obermann events, CAPS/IP, & other campus interdisciplinary projects.

Indicators of Success:

• Conduct Post-event evaluations for each event; improvement will be made based on feedback results.

Goal

Reshape graduate programs to strengthen area studies in China, Japan, and Korea.

Strategy 1

Rename and restructure MA programs to better fit the needs of students and job markets.

Critical Tasks:

• Change the current name of "Asian Civilization" to "Asian Studies." (Note: The MA program was established three decades ago based on faculty strengths in premodern literature/culture and historical linguistics. The title of "Asian Civilization" is no longer accurately reflects the strengths of the current Department for the MA program).
• Restructure the MA program's sub tracks to take full advantage of current faculty strength in the areas of Chinese, Japanese, and Korean studies. 
• Strengthen the interdisciplinary MA track. 

Action Items:

• Follow the Graduate College's Procedure to initiate the name change and content adjustment process.
• Survey new directions in MA programs of peer institutions to develop a more competitive/innovative MA program.
• Work with CAPS faculty to recruit more students for the interdisciplinary MA track.

Indicators of Success:

• The new program will be in place by 2022.
• Recruitment of new MA applications in Chinese, Japanese, and Korean studies will be fully restored in 2023. 
• Increased number of students in the interdisciplinary MA track.

Strategy 2

Consolidate BA majors in critical languages (Chinese, Hindi, Japanese, Korean, and Russian) and prepare students for graduate programs.

Critical Tasks:

• Increase enrollment of departmental BA programs to enlarge the pool for MA studies.
• Develop recruitment & marketing strategies for major & minor in pre-med, global health, marketing, and other Tippie subjects, bringing in new student participation.

Action Items:

• Outreach local school districts and high schools to identify potential candidates for majors. 
• Create a gateway course in East Asian related subjects to attract more incoming students to study in ASLL.
• Create a promotional video and brochure of ASLL to raise student awareness of opportunities to study BA majors in ASLL.
• Increase online courses in Chinese and Korean by seeking internal and external grants.

Indicators of Success:

• Increased number of majors and in all programs in ASLL.
• The proposed gateway courses will be in place within next 2-3 years.
• The video and brochure will be available in 2021.
• Beginning level online courses for Chinese and Korean have been initiated and will continue to add more courses.

Goal

Promote diversity, equity, and inclusion through faculty and student recruitment, curriculum enhancement, outreach, study abroad, and community engagement.

Strategy 1

Maintain a highly diverse faculty composition and student body.

Critical Tasks:

• Maintain the tradition of a highly diverse faculty composition.
• Create a welcome environment for faculty and students of all colors.
• Support minority and international students to study in ASLL.

Action Items:

• Follow DEI guidelines when recruiting new faculty members to eliminate bias.
• Understand and address individual faculty and students' needs by conducting regular surveys and holding individual meetings.
• Create opportunities for minority and international students' success by establishing a faculty-student mentoring system.
• Work closely with diverse student associations and underrepresented groups on campus to address their needs.

Indicators of Success:

• An appropriate percentage of diverse faculty composition is maintained.
• Increased rate of faculty retention.
• Increased rate of successful completion of courses by minority and under-represented students.

Strategy 2

Organizing more outreaching events to foster local, national, and international connections and collaboration.

Critical Tasks:

• Collaborate with the College of Education to offer more workshops for Iowa K-12 Chinese teachers.
• Continue our outreach efforts on offering critical-language teacher training for K-16 educators.
• Connect UI critical language learners to learners beyond campus.
• Continue outreach efforts to promote Asian language and cultures among local Communities.

Action Items:

• Continue with Biennial K-16 Iowa Chinese Teaching and Research Symposium;
• Work with CAPS to offer teacher training UI-credit workshops in Asian languages for K-16 teachers.
• Continue with the annual publication of North American student essays in Chinese.
• Continue to host state-wide higher education speech contests: biennial Iowa Chinese and Japanese speech contest to include participants from all higher education units in the State of Iowa.
• Create joint online interactive events on language with a specific purpose and cultural workshops with institutions in China, Japan, and Korea.
• Continue to apply for National Security Agency grants to offer summer programs for Iowa high school students (Chinese and Russian);
• Continue King Sejong Institute's offering noncredit Korean language and culture courses/events for Iowa communities;
• Continue with Russian cultural festival, talent show, and Russian literature on the Streets;
• Collaborate with CAPS to organize the annual Asian festival by involving graduate and undergraduate students and local communities.

Indicators of Success:

• Exit surveys will be conducted to evaluate the successes of the workshops and events. Further improvement will be made based on feedback.
• STARTALK grant application will be submitted once the grant competition is resumed. (Currently it is paused due to pandemic)

Strategy 3

Empower students to acquire attitudes, values, and skills that enhance cross-cultural communication.

Critical Tasks:

• Create more opportunities for students to study abroad and for providing a local experience that can approximate international experience as closely as possible.
• Create more opportunities for local, national, and international internships by working together with the Career Development Center.
• Creating more opportunities and conditions for students to consider honors in majors and create conditions for students to apply for external scholarships.
• Continue with existing on-campus language and cultural activities offered by each program to engage students in learning beyond classrooms.

Action Items:

• Develop more faculty-led field trips, structured internships, and summer study abroad programs. 
• Strengthen existing study abroad programs in Chinese and Russian and expand the partnership study abroad programs in Japanese and Korean by applying for Fulbright grants.
• Identify US companies in the target countries to seek internship opportunities while studying abroad. Identify local US companies with business in China, Japan, Korea, and Russia to create opportunities for students to utilize their linguistic and cultural knowledge in a global business context.
• Advertise rigorously for honors in majors every Fall semester and encourage top students to consider honors in majors.
• Identify student candidates to apply for external scholarships, such as critical language scholarships, Fulbright, Boren, and Freeman.
• Continue offering various cultural festivals for each culture and language-specific learning activities for different language levels.

Indicators of Success:

• Increased number of students participating in study abroad programs in all programs; 
• The Japanese summer program will be in place in Summer 2023. 
• The Korean summer program will be in place within next five years.
• Increased opportunities for internships. 
• Increased number of students graduating with honors in majors. 
• Increased number of students receiving external scholarships.

Strategy 4

Host more post-doctoral fellows and other visiting scholars to increase our engagement with other units and universities in the Asian and Slavic region of Europe.

Critical Tasks:

• Establish more international connections to collaborate on research and teaching.

Action Items:

• Invite more international scholars and specialists to ASLL and encourage faculty members to present their cutting-edge research at international academic organizations and institutes.

Indicator of Success:

• Increased number of visiting scholars and international academic activities.