By Tian Liu
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The University of Iowa Office of Admissions is providing campus tours in foreign languages upon request starting this semester.
Currently, the Admission Visitors Center offers campus tours in four different languages: English, Mandarin Chinese, Spanish, and Portuguese.
“The tour in foreign language is exactly the same tour, but offered in a separate language,” Tom Paulsen said. Paulsen is the senior associate director for outreach and recruitment in the Office of Admissions.
Paulsen said the idea came to him because many universities have already established this kind of service.
“Students have had certain English proficiency, but their families don’t,” Paulsen said.
Paulsen also emphasized the family’s role in choosing a college and viewing campuses.
“Going to which college is a family decision, not a student’s personal decision,” Paulsen said.
To achieve the goal, Paulsen decided to recruit people who speak these languages to be foreign language campus guides. Because there are a limited amount of language speakers, there aren’t many guides.
He said he hoped without the language barrier, the bilingual campus tour could make a meaningful campus visit experience for the families that don’t speak English.
“We want to let the family know how welcome and how inclusive the university is,” Paulsen said.
Yue Xue, an international student from China, said providing bilingual campus tours in Mandarin Chinese would be good for future Chinese students who are interested in attending the UI and their families, as more Chinese students are planning to study abroad.
“I think Mandarin campus tours will benefit Chinese parents a lot, since a lot of them are not proficient at English,” Xue said.
She agreed with Paulsen that bilingual campus tours would help parents and students to decide on a university.
The main purpose for the bilingual campus tours was to portray the UI as place that welcomes diversity, Paulsen said.
“[Providing bilingual campus tours] is a small part of that,” Paulsen said.
The university provides a variety of bilingual services across the campus.
Qiao Li, an international student from China who started school at the UI in 2014, said the school now provides more language services than when she started school.
“I have gained lots of benefits from these services for both academic and non-academic areas,” Li said.
The UI provides both writing and speaking support for non-English Speaker students, through resources like the writing center and conversation center.
Li said she attends the conversation center regularly.
“I think it is an excellent way to know the American lifestyle then get involved in the society,” Li said.
Iowa City also has systems in place for those who do not speak English well.
Li said for these who are not proficient at English, they could ask for translation help such as at the emergency room at UI Hospitals and Clinics and local banks.
For now, the first scheduled bilingual campus tour is in early November. The bilingual campus tour is only provided upon specific request.