A new award has been announced for students of SHS and it is sure to revolutionize college and job resumes!

The Certificate of Multilingual Scholars is awarded to students who have proven themselves to be proficient in languages other English. This award can distinguish one person from the throngs of peers on applications!

To earn this award, one must earn at least 8 credits in English Language Arts, pass the English Language Arts graduation qualifying exam (ISTEP or ECA depending on Cohort year), and pass any external language assessment that isn’t English.

Diane Altemeyer, Director of Federal and State Programs for SCSC said, “For students who will be entering the workforce after graduation, having a certificate to validate their language proficiency, in addition to their transcript, will help employers identify that this truly is a student that is able to use the language in a variety of contexts. For students opting for postsecondary education, IDOE is still in communication with university partners to determine if there can be a mechanism to award credit/placement to students who have earned this recognition.”

There are many companies that pay well for the multilingual, a major example being Disney. As Disney is a very worldwide company with parks and complexes all over the world, it has a huge need for people who can speak multiple languages in order to deal with people from all around the world, especially at Disney World. Disney World gets an average of 53,000 people per day, coming from countries such as the United States, China, Thailand, Japan, South Africa, Niger,and many other countries, all of which speak a collective myriad of languages, which causes a wealth of problems when it comes to communication. This dilemma with communication makes translators for Disney very valuable and the job very lucrative, so someone who has a Certificate of Multilingual Scholars would stand out among the rest of applicants.

For more information on the Certificate, check out the website at:

https://www.doe.in.gov/ccr/certificate-multilingual-proficiency