Campus Diversity and Global Education: A Case Study of a Japanese Program

The recent influx of international students from Asia to the United States has drastically changed the demographics of students studying languages, including languages other than English, in many large universities. For some languages, it is not uncommon for international students from Asia to constitute more than 50% of current enrollments in a language class. This new reality poses a number of questions, including how to meet students' diverse needs and goals for language study and how to mobilize increasing student diversity to enhance the development of global competence among all students, regardless of country of origin. Using semi-structured exploratory interviews conducted with domestic and international students of Japanese as a foreign language at an American university, this study investigated the challenges and opportunities presented in the globalized language classroom.