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news
A great opportunity
for international students
Story and Photos
by Yoshinori Okada
Special to the Online Forty-Niner
At the back end
of the Learning
Assistance Center in Library East, there is a small haven
for international students. Here, the conversation
lab has offered international students good opportunities
to improve their academic skills, as well as their English
skills, all free of charge.
Since it opened
in the mid-1970s, the lab has led lots of international students
to academic success. The lab is open to all CSULB international
students and to other students who feel that they can benefit
from this service. The schedule
is available online.
Students for whom
English is a second language (ESL) are still expected to handle
coursework, make presentations, participate in discussion,
and function effectively in fluent English. It is often the
case that they face troubles managing those overloads of coursework.
Yet, to be academically
successful, mastering of English skills is necessary for the
students. Learning English requires enormous efforts, but
it also deepens ESL students' cultural knowledge of the United
States. For these reasons, the language lab is just the place
for international students.
The lab provides
international students with:
- Opportunities
to discuss course content, reading assignments, writing
assignments, oral presentations, or study strategies;
- Help in improving
vocabulary, English syntax, pronunciation, or other aspects
of a foreign language;
- Informal conversation
about topics of the student's choice to build general fluency
in speaking English.
Mike Tsai, a business
major from Taiwan, is one of the regular students at the lab.
Every day after class, he heads for the lab.
"I can learn
about how to speak English more fluently and I feel my English
is getting better," Tsai said.
The number of international
students joining the lab has nearly doubled in the past two
years, according to the International
Conversation Lab Coordinator, Marshall Thomas.
Thomas said one
of the causes for this increase is that "more students
tell other students to come." He is delighted, saying,
"It's exciting to have so many students."
Students learn
not only from tutors teaching formal English used in classrooms
and the different academic subjects, but also from interacting
and using informal colloquial speech, better known as slang.
Some ESL students have trouble understanding slang in a conversation
with native speakers or in movies and TV shows.
Besides learning,
the students, especially new students here at CSULB,
can enjoy a great opportunity for meeting people and making
friends.
"I made a
lot of friends from all over the world," Yi-quang Chen,
an undeclared freshman from Taiwan said. "It's a good
place to meet and talk with other students," he said.
There are currently
about 15 volunteer tutors teaching an average of four to six
students in each session. The conversation lab is open Monday
through Thursday from10 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. And the students
can join it on the drop-in basis, which is good for busy students.
If you feel the lab might be of some help to you, just go
to check it out.
For more information
about the services, please call (562) 985-5350.
You can also check
the following links:
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International
students meet at the conversation lab.
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| Mike
Tsai, a business major from Taiwan, is one of the regular
students at the lab. |
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