Hey all,
This was an interesting article I stumbled upon and thought I’d share. For clarification for those unfamiliar with Utah history, the headquarters of the Mormon church is in Utah; therefore, there are a lot of Mormons who live here. At age 19 and 21 many of the young men and women in the church go serve missions around the world for 2 years, learning the language of the country they are serving in very well since they are fully immersed in it. Because of all the missionaries that have returned from missions and live in Utah, we have a high percentage of our population that speaks various languages. Foreign language immersion programs have been becoming more and more common in our state, usually teaching Spanish, French, and Mandarin. Here is the piece of the article refering to the elementary school, and the full article link is below.
"Not all of the NSA’s attention in Utah is focused on the computer science know-how of college students. NSA representatives from Washington were in Provo Friday to visit grade school students in the Chinese immersion program at Wasatch Elementary School.
While it might be a bit of a stretch to say the spy agency is recruiting among first-graders, the NSA’s expectations for its linguists require advanced language skills, and the agency is interested in the language programs Utah is offering in both elementary and secondary schools.
“The NSA doesn’t look at anybody unless they’re at a superior level,” said Gregg Roberts, the world language specialist with the Utah State Office of Education. Roberts was part of the group visiting Wasatch Elementary with the NSA.
The skills foreign-language students can have are expected to be above those gained from an in-country learning experience typical among LDS missionaries sent abroad. “These young kids are projected to be way beyond a returned missionary when they graduate from high school, at an advanced level of reading, writing and speaking,” Roberts said."