Nicholas Platt
International Education and the National Interest

November 21, 2002 Washington, D.C. --
What's a person who's spent his life in the State Department and living in many other parts of the world (China, Japan, the Philippines, and Pakistan, to name few) doing spending so much time on American K-12 education?

Well, part of the answer is personal. When I entered the Foreign Service, having spent many years at some of our finest educational institutions, I knew a great deal about the United States and Europe. But I quickly discovered that I knew nothing at all about Asia, which, after all, is home to 60% of the world's population. In fact, I found that the world that I had prepared for wasn't there. Today, decades later, Asia is even more significant to the United States. For example, Asia contains half the world's Muslims, and the only "hot" confrontation between nuclear-armed powers; it is of enormous and increasing importance in terms of trade; and over the last twenty years, much of Asia has witnessed an historic transformation towards market economies and democracies. The transformation is not complete but all this represents a crucial "need to know." But our schools still give short shrift to other cultures and regions of the world that now affect many aspects of our lives. And that is why the Asia Society is committed as an institution to devoting major attention to this problem.

But much of the answer is about our national foreign policy - how the United States is going to engage effectively in international affairs in the coming period.

You've just heard from Secretary Powell, with whom I've worked closely over many years. After meeting with him recently, I can tell you he is deeply committed to the proposition that the next generation of young people around the world need to know more about each other because, I quote, "they will be building and sharing the same future". And he is very supportive of the new campaign Jim Hunt and Vivien Stewart are leading to promote teaching and learning about other world regions, cultures and languages in every school district in the United States.

I'd like to touch briefly on two aspects of the intersection of foreign policy and education policy that I think are crucial to the success of our foreign affairs.

First, Languages: Americans assume that the world speaks English. And indeed the spread of English around the world has helped us to communicate more easily with many countries and people.

But as September 11 showed us, when the State Department issued urgent calls for speakers of Arabic, we don't have enough national capacity in the major world languages to meet the needs of our intelligence and counter-terrorism communities, of our military (the army, for example, has been stationed in 140 countries on every continent over the past ten years), for effective partnership with our allies, or for homeland security, where police, public health and law enforcement officials will increasingly need to be able to deal with many different language groups. In all, some 80-plus federal agencies need foreign language expertise. And they are not simply looking for translators but for analysts and experts in many fields who can interpret the cultural context too.

Every time there is a crisis from Sputnik to the collapse of the Soviet Union, to dealing with illegal drug smuggling and money laundering, to our current intense focus on terrorism, there is a short-term burst of public attention to languages. (I should say that the State Department and Defense Language training schools are second to none, and that Secretary Powell's Diplomatic Readiness Initiative is ramping up levels of needed languages in the State department). But these federal efforts need a pool coming from the education system. Language learning takes a long time and in the changing world environment, the levels of language learning that were adequate in the past are not adequate today. We need to start at younger ages and in all the major world languages.

I know this is not an easy issue to solve. Most of us live in English-speaking environments, we have shortages of foreign language teachers and much of our past practice of foreign language teaching in schools has been ineffective. But I do know that if we are to have a K-16 pipeline in the major world languages, it will need a strategic plan and partnership between the users of language skills and the state and local educational officials who have to decide how to allocate time and resources in schools.

Second, education needs to be a two-way street. You have been talking about the rudimentary knowledge of American students about the world outside our borders. But we now understand all too clearly that there is tremendous misinformation about the United States in many parts of the world too. By and large, I have found that citizens of other countries tend to know far more about us than we know about them. But much of their information comes from American media, including Hollywood, or from deliberately distorted sources-the now famous web sites and radio and television stations of rogue states and terrorist groups. And this is why people-to-people diplomacy, the educational, cultural, and exchange activities that promote dialog, the sharing of ideas and the creation of direct personal and institutional relationships are so important.

Our report, Asia in the Schools, called for strengthening educational exchanges and, particularly for increasing the numbers of teachers, principals and other educators whose work closely affects young people to have such opportunities for cross-cultural experiences.

Our report also called for every school in the Unites States to have an ongoing link, real or virtual, with a school in another part of the world. At the Asia Society we have just created the US-Japan Youth Forum, as a bilingual internet-based platform for American and Japanese young people to exchange views and create joint projects on issues of mutual interest. And we want to extend that model to China and India. And I know that some of the organizations involved in the Friendship Through Education initiative, that is creating links with selected schools in Muslim countries and areas has been presenting these ideas at the States institute. I urge you all to develop such school-to-school linkages.

So, I stand with Colin Powell and my other esteemed panelists from the trade and education sectors tonight, in affirming my belief that the education of our younger generations about other world regions, cultures, and languages is fundamental to the success of our national security policies and the effective pursuit of our goals in the international system. Thank you.

Nicholas Platt is President of Asia Society. He served as U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan and the Philippines.

LINKS

US Secretary of State Colin Powell Address at Asia Society Annual Dinner 2002

A selection of Asia Society websites:

AskAsia.org is one of the premiere resources for K-12 educators and students interested in Asian and Asian American studies.

AsiaSource.org presents interpretation of breaking news stories, analysis of trends in Asia, guides to Asian visual and performing arts, access to country profiles, and more.

AsiaBusinessToday.org provides knowledgeable, unbiased information on a range of issues including US-Asia trade, technology developments, and global finance.

AsiaSociety.org provides information about the Society's programs, exhibitions, and permanent collection, as well as general background on the Society.