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Official Languages committee  The loss I refer to with respect to students who stop using their second language after being in immersion in high school also applies to people who end up in a job where they cannot use their second language, or in an environment where that culture does not exist. Ultimately, the culture of the organization depends on the leadership of the person in charge of the department, who will impose that culture.

April 2nd, 2009Committee meeting

Richard Clément

Official Languages committee  Your question is a complex one. I fully agree with you as to what might be called the international hegemony of the English language. That is the case in the field of science, just as it is everywhere else. How can a university allow that to happen? Well, first of all, academic freedom means that university teachers can produce material in the language of their choice.

April 2nd, 2009Committee meeting

Richard Clément

Official Languages committee  Yes, it is. In terms of the level of bilingualism of university teaching staff—because we also have the problem of recruiting high-level researchers who are extremely competent and bilingual—on a small scale, the university deals with that by including in the initial hiring contract an obligation to become bilingual in order to achieve tenure.

April 2nd, 2009Committee meeting

Richard Clément

Official Languages committee  You are absolutely right. If students were better trained in their second language by the time they arrive at university, it would be easier for us to integrate them into our own immersion system. There is no doubt that they can be better trained. However, if it were decided that language training would no longer be offered at the post-secondary level, that everything had to happen at the primary and secondary levels—we would have a problem, because students arriving at university—we encountered this problem ourselves, and that is the reason why we created our immersion program—would no longer be using their second language and, within the space of a year, would lose their ability to speak that language.

April 2nd, 2009Committee meeting

Richard Clément

Official Languages committee  Yes, certainly.

April 2nd, 2009Committee meeting

Richard Clément

Official Languages committee  The immersion system falls within my colleague's purview. So, I will let her answer that question.

April 2nd, 2009Committee meeting

Richard Clément

April 2nd, 2009Committee meeting

Richard Clément

Official Languages committee  The research community reacted strongly, and particularly my colleague, Rodrigue Landry, from the Canadian Institute for Research on Linguistic Minorities. We all agreed. At the time, I also got in touch with him, with a view to bolster our argument. Unfortunately, researchers do not always have the desired political impact.

April 2nd, 2009Committee meeting

Richard Clément

April 2nd, 2009Committee meeting

Richard Clément

Official Languages committee  It cannot be said that this ability deteriorates continually as you age. However, you reach a plateau. Adults can learn another language, but a completely different teaching style is required. You have to rely on the structural knowledge of the first language and transfer that to the second language.

April 2nd, 2009Committee meeting

Richard Clément

Official Languages committee  Well, that is your opinion!

April 2nd, 2009Committee meeting

Richard Clément

April 2nd, 2009Committee meeting

Richard Clément

April 2nd, 2009Committee meeting

Richard Clément

Official Languages committee  Thank you. Of course, this is not a recent issue. It is something that we have been looking at through research on bilingualism for many years now. In terms of the best time to begin, I would say, the earlier the better, for all kinds of reasons: first of all, because a child has a more flexible brain, and also, for reasons that relate to the types of educational methods that can be used with children, methods that are not effective with adults.

April 2nd, 2009Committee meeting

Richard Clément

Official Languages committee  Based on our institutional experience at the University of Ottawa, I can certainly say that, as a department head, it is preferable to hire people who already have a certain level of proficiency in the second language, even if they may require additional training subsequently.

April 2nd, 2009Committee meeting

Richard Clément