My name is Terry Hartle and I am Senior Vice President of the American Council on Education (ACE), an association representing 1,800 public and private two- and four- year colleges and research universities. I am pleased to have the opportunity to present our views on Title VI of the Higher Education Act. On behalf of the higher education community, we express our deep appreciation for this Committee’s long-time support for these programs. We believe that recent global developments only underscore the importance of training specialists in foreign languages, cultures and international business who can provide help to the government, the private sector, educational institutions and the media, and who can communicate across cultures on our behalf.

There are two important pillars of international education programs at institutions of higher education. The first part of the federal role in international education is the support provided to institutions to develop expert knowledge and to train the next generation of international affairs experts about the issues surrounding global security, commerce, and foreign languages. The other includes the traditional study abroad opportunities where students study for a semester or longer overseas. The flexibility of federal student financial aid and the Fulbright-Hays programs make these opportunities possible for thousands of students each year.

Congress created Title VI in the National Defense Education Act of 1958 out of a sense of crisis about the lack of knowledge in the United States of other countries and cultures. Spanning more than four decades, this program remains the federal government’s most comprehensive and successful mechanism for supporting the production of the nation’s expertise in foreign languages, and areas of other international studies, including international business. Together with Fulbright-Hays (Section 102(b)(6)), Title VI authorizes a comprehensive set of activities designed to increase attention to international education across the educational spectrum. Federal funds leverage a large amount of non-Federal funding, thus having a substantial impact on the field of international education for a small investment of taxpayer dollars.

Title VI contains three parts that authorize 10 funded programs:

Currently, the Title VI program receives $86.2 million to support these programs. A short summary that describes each Title VI program is attached to my testimony.

The federal government plays a critical role in international and foreign language education because international expertise is critical to the conduct of U.S. foreign policy, to maintaining our national security, and to ensuring the health and vitality of the U.S. economy in a global marketplace. Informed decisions in these areas depend on citizens who have foreign language skills and an understanding of other nations’ cultures and systems. Just as the federal government maintains military reserves to be called upon when needed, it should have an educational infrastructure that steadily trains sufficient numbers of American students and scholars with expertise in international education and foreign languages.

For example, Title VI provides funding for instruction in the "less commonly taught languages" and world areas with a serious shortfall of experts. Nearly 80 percent of the graduate students currently in these fields are supported under Title VI.

Graduates of Title VI centers serve in key U.S. government positions in all agencies involved in international relations and foreign affairs. We believe that most of the career security foreign language and area specialists in agencies such as the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) were trained at institutions with Title VI-funded centers.

According to the U.S. Department of Education, over 1,000 graduates from Title VI area centers in the class of 2001 now work for the federal government in a civilian capacity. Another 400 graduates work for the U.S. military as well as the over 600 who are employed by state and local government. Specific agencies make heavy use of the Title VI program. For example, the U.S. Army Foreign Area Officer (FAO) program has sent its officers to Title VI centers for their master’s degrees in language and area studies training for more than three decades.

In addition, the Title VI grantees conduct extensive outreach to government agencies at all levels. A few recent examples:

National security also is increasingly linked to commerce, and U.S. business is widely engaged around the world with joint ventures, partnerships, and economic activities that require its employees—both at home and abroad—to have international expertise. A recent survey of U.S. corporations found that almost 80 percent of the firms said that they would place a greater emphasis on international competence among management and employees in the next 10 years. Despite extensive efforts to internationalize business education in the last decade, U.S. business schools continue to fall short of fulfilling the need of businesses for personnel who can think and act in a global context.

Title VI-Part B (CIBERS) supports important programs that internationalize business education and help small and medium-sized U.S. businesses access emerging markets— a step toward reducing the trade deficit and creating U.S. jobs. The Centers of International Business Education and Research have made great strides in internationalizing U.S. business education, as well as providing U.S. corporations with the international skills and knowledge to compete globally. They now are in a unique position to serve as a national resource in providing the education and research needed as part of coping with the aftermath of September 11.

In recent years, a small number of critics have criticized the Title VI programs. Those who criticize the Title VI programs make a number of charges but the most important ones are that: Title VI Centers are ideologically biased; that the people who work in the Title VI Centers are unwilling to work for the federal government; they seek to undermine American foreign policy and actively discourage students from working for the federal government; the process by which the Title VI grantees is chosen is flawed; and that colleges and universities are trying to kill the National Security Education Program (NSEP).

We strenuously disagree with these allegations. None of these charges has any basis in fact. Rather, they represent a triumph of ideology over analysis. Moreover, let me state emphatically and for the record that Title VI does not perpetuate, encourage or support monolithic viewpoints or ideologies. Knowledge advances best when a variety of ideas and perspectives are in competition with each other.

The lack of time makes it difficult to respond to the individual criticisms and incidents that have been cited. Rather, let me make three basic points about the criticism of Title VI.

First, almost all of the criticism is being leveled against a small and specific part of the Title VI programs— the Middle East Studies Centers of the National Resource Centers. Last year, there were 118 National Resource Centers and 15 were focused on the Middle East. The Middle East Centers consumed approximately $4 million, out of the $86.2 million provided for the Title VI programs. But more specifically, the criticism is concentrated on the history and political science work of these centers. While I believe this criticism is exaggerated and misguided, it is a fairly small part of Title VI that has generated controversy.

Second, at the heart of the criticism of the Middle East Centers is an academic dispute that focuses on the work of Edward Said, a professor of Comparative European Literature at Columbia University. In a work published in 1978 he argued that Western meddling in the Middle East throughout much of the 20th Century produced the conflict and turbulence that continues to plague that region of the world. While critics claim that this view is the "ruling intellectual paradigm" in academic area studies, this theory reached its apex of popularity more than a decade ago and has been waning ever since. Even a cursory review of the syllabi of the Middle East Centers clearly shows this work only occasionally appears as an assigned reading or on a resource list. Indeed, historians and political scientists rarely find this theory useful.

My third point is that the criticisms of the Middle East Centers are based on a small number of anecdotes and the retelling of these anecdotes often leaves out important information. For example, Mr. Kurtz repeatedly refers to "a Title VI workshop for K-12 teachers that assigned readings from only the most virulent critics of American foreign policy."

The facts are as follows: the workshop in question was held at the University of California at Santa Barbara. At the request of the school district, the session was designed in part to explore the question "Why Do They Hate Us." Not surprisingly, some of the background readings for such a session will be rather hostile to the United States because the topic asks participants to examine the views of those who hold views we find reprehensible as a way of understanding them. Does it mean the professors are anti-American or hostile to American foreign policy? Of course not. Would these readings have been assigned if a different topic had been chosen? No.

Title VI is working well and does not need to be substantially modified in this reauthorization. The Title VI statute is structurally sound, and poised to meet the challenges ahead with modest enhancements. Under separate cover, the Coalition for International Education, a group of 29 higher education associations has sent the Committee its recommendations for Title VI. They were developed from the findings of a policy research conference supported by the Ford Foundation and the U.S. Department of Education, and an extensive process of deliberation by a broad spectrum of the higher education community. I invite subcommittee members to view the research papers and discussion reports from that conference at http://www.duke.edu/web/cis/globalchallenges/.

Title VI has served the nation well in the past and will continue to do so in the future. Consistent with federal objectives, Title VI centers have played a central role in developing public understanding of economic, defense and foreign policy issues; in preparing diplomats and other experts in foreign affairs; and in providing critical analysis for national decision-making. The knowledge and capacity developed by Title VI and the individuals who have been trained by Title VI are a priceless national resource.

I thank you for the opportunity to testify on this important issue. Thank you again for the Committee’s long history of support for Title VI programs.