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Foreign Language Program

Fletcher actively seeks to enroll a diverse class of students who have demonstrated academic excellence, have a wide range of personal, professional, and academic experience, and have a strong commitment to an international career. Fletcher students often bring a wealth of linguistic and cultural knowledge and have ambitions for improving their language skills. These skills are highly valued at Fletcher, and students often use them to enhance their academic studies and career prospects, while also contributing to the education of their peers and to the scholarship and practice of international relations. Although language proficiency is not required for Master’s degree students, a number of options are available to assist students in their language endeavors. An overview is provided below. Current students, please visit myFletcher for more information.

  • Language courses are not part of the Fletcher curriculum, but Fletcher students who wish to supplement their foreign language learning have several options for taking language courses.

    Students may enroll in a language course for credit through cross-registration at Tufts University’s School of Arts and Sciences, or at Harvard University. Language courses at Tufts are offered by the Department of International Literary and Cultural Studies and the Department of Romance Studies. A language course taken for credit replaces one elective and counts towards cross-registration limits. Students may enroll in one foreign language course through cross-registration without a petition. Further credit for language study requires approval from the Committee on Student Academic Programs (CSAP) to verify that it is appropriate for the student’s academic program and/or professional goals.

    All Fletcher students are eligible to audit one language course at Tufts per term, with the permission of the language instructor, in addition to their normal load of four courses. Audited language courses do not appear on the student's transcript.

  • Beginning in Fall 2022, Fletcher is partnering with Language Testing International (LTI) to provide language exams for students who seek a professional, globally recognizable credential, certifying their reading and/or speaking ability in a language other than English. LTI offers official language certificates in several languages, and students may choose between three different international language proficiency scales on which to be evaluated. LTI’s accreditation process ensures that results are consistent and reliable. The exams offer flexibility, as they are scheduled by the student, as well as robust accessibility features.

    Fletcher students who take a language exam with LTI will receive an official certificate verifying their language level according to the chosen proficiency scale, which includes a certificate code that potential employers can use to verify the test results. Those who choose to be evaluated on the ACTFL scale will also have access to a digital “Credly” badge that can be used on LinkedIn and other social media sites.

    Fletcher will support one reading exam and one oral exam per student during their enrollment at the school.  All Fletcher students currently enrolled in a degree program as of September 1, 2022 are eligible, including those who have taken language exams prior to September 1, 2022.

  • Tufts University’s StAAR (Student Accessibility and Academic Resources) Center offers language tutoring and conversation practice sessions with trained tutors, which are open to Fletcher students. Please visit the StAAR Center website and select "Subject Tutoring” for schedules.

    Fletcher’s Fares Center for Eastern Mediterranean Studies offers language tables in Arabic, Turkish, Hebrew, and Farsi.

    The Fletcher Language Practice Matching Program connects students, faculty, and staff with partners and small groups who are interested in improving their fluency, helping others to improve their skills, or just speaking a particular language together, whether about scholarly or social topics.

    Fletcher offers Mini-Grants for Language Practice to support language-based group activities where peers keep each other accountable for their language learning, such as meeting for coffee to practice describing their studies in different language, attending a non-English-speaking event, or undertaking an outing dedicated to language practice.

    Fletcher hosts a periodic Language Social Hour throughout the academic year, which offers an opportunity to join a conversation in a language other than English and find language study partners. Current students should check the myFletcher calendar for upcoming dates.

  • Fletcher students have free access to Mango Languages, an online language learning resource designed to give users comprehensive conversational language and grammar skills in over 60 languages. Tufts students may log into Mango Languages here to create a profile.

    The Learning Languages Research Guide provided by Tufts Libraries outlines numerous additional free web resources, including both reference tools and language-learning programs.