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UH-Clear Lake Foreign Language Program helps runner prepare

By Diana North
09-March-2009

Learning a foreign language or improving conversational English can do more than enhance career goals. For Doc Pepper, a League City resident and marathon runner, learning to speak a second language helped him communicate during a French marathon where participants run the course sampling wine instead of water.

Running a full marathon distance of 26 miles through the heart of the Bordeaux wine country of France in 2007, Doc and his wife Laura were two of only 107 Americans to run the Marathon Du Médoc, an event established in 1984 by a group of passionate marathon fans.

While Pepper trained for the marathon by running, he was able to prepare for French conversation with fellow runners and others by taking classes through University of Houston-Clear Lake's Foreign Languages Program. He also wanted to be able to order at the local restaurants.

"I wanted to be able to speak French so I could order properly," said Pepper. "That's what got me into the class. I also wanted to study long enough to be conversant in the language."

Representing their running group, affiliated with United Space Alliance, the couple raised money for the Houston Food Bank and made a promise to donors that they kept during their run abroad by toasting Texas with other runners during a stop at a small chateau.

Pepper credits the program, and Foreign Languages Program Director Christine Paul, for making his French classes "fun, interesting and helpful." Being able to communicate effectively helped make the couple's trip to France what Pepper calls a fantastic experience.

French is just one of the language lessons available through the UH-Clear Lake's foreign language program. Others are German, Italian, Japanese, Mandarin, Russian and Spanish-all offered at beginner to advanced levels. New courses like Brazilian Portuguese are also available with as few as five students signed up.

"One of the benefits to language classes is that people connect with other people, they learn about another culture and a different way of looking at the world," said Paul.

Classes focus on developing conversational skills quickly and students are speaking the new language from the first class. Grammar and vocabulary are learned while practicing oral drills with other students.

The small, informal classes run weekly for seven weeks. New student fees are $135 and returning students are $115. Private group lessons are also available. The next session of classes will begin April 19.

English enhancement classes are free for enrolled international students at UH-Clear Lake, but community members can take advantage of them as well. Spanish classes are the most popular, with many aerospace employees and UH-Clear Lake alumni enrolled. Also available are language training workshops given onsite at area businesses that provide lunchtime lessons on the job for area companies.

Finally, the Foreign Language Program Office is sponsoring a new weekly lunchtime program called Power of Kabbalah-a six-week course offering video broadcasts of Eitan Yardeni's lessons and workshops on spiritual wisdom. Participants meet from noon to 1 p.m. in the university's Bayou Building, Room 1219, 2700 Bay Area Blvd., Houston. Space for the free course is limited to 30. The next session will begin April 6.

For more information about the Foreign Language and English Enhancement Program, to register for language courses that begin mid-April, or to find out about the Power of Kabbalah lunch-time sessions, visit www.uhcl.edu/fl, call 281-283-3033 or e-mail paul@uhcl.edu.

Article on line at: The University of Houston Clear Lake