Thank you for allowing me to address the important issue of foreign language education in your association's newsletter and regional bulletin. I appreciate the opportunity to reach over 1,000 North Carolina teachers and over 10,000 foreign language professionals throughout the southeast United States.

As the former eight-year state Superintendent of the Department of Public Instruction,
I know well the importance of foreign language instruction to our overall mission to educate our children. The skills a student develops through learning a foreign language become valuable assets for lifetime learning and academic achievement. This challenging intellectual endeavor stimulates a student's interest in overall schoolwork and helps children develop a positive self image through mastery of non-native communication. Finally, the increased English proficiency derived from foreign language instruction provides a solid groundwork on which as student can build educational accomplishment.

Our increasingly high technology and global economic system demands that America's workers be the most productive and highly educated in the world. North Carolina's economic competitors no longer reside in Virginia and South Carolina but in Germany, Japan, Mexico and China, countries where foreign language education has a more established tradition than in our own. We must support foreign language instruction as part of our future-oriented effort to maintain America's leadership role in the world's economy and a rising standard of living for our people. You can be sure that I will work to ensure Congress does its part in support of foreign language education.