Transcript File - Michael Smith

EMPLOYABILITY AND
EDUCATION:
MULTILINGUALISM AS A
TRADE
Michael Smith
Overview

Educational context of the 21st century
 Inspiring




Education
Economics of Language
Thinking Global, Act Local – The Language Industry
Tools of the Trade
The Missing Links
Education in the

st
21
Century
Rationale for Learning International Languages
 The
value, for Canadian society as a whole, of learning
international languages can be summarized as follows:
 increased
awareness of and sensitivity to cultural and
linguistic diversity
 improved potential in the Canadian and global marketplace
and workplace
 enhanced role in the international community.
Education in the

st
21
Century
There are also many personal reasons for learning
an additional language or for enrolling in an
international language course at school or in a
community program. Students who have no previous
knowledge of the language may be interested in:
 more
opportunity to communicate directly with people
from other language groups and gain a deeper insight
into their culture
 a broader range of educational, career and leisure
opportunities.
Education in the

st
21
Century
Students who possess some knowledge of the
language or a family connection to the culture may
have different reasons for learning:
 renewing
contact with a heritage language and culture
that may have been lost through assimilation
 maintaining a first language that is not the majority
language in the community
 developing literacy in a first language that is not the
majority language in the community.
Education in the

st
21
Century
There is significant evidence to suggest that all
language learners receive some additional indirect
benefits from their language learning experience:
development of increased grammatical abilities in the first
language—phenomenon of additive bilingualism
 enhanced cognitive functioning, particularly increased
ability to conceptualize and to think abstractly; more
cognitive flexibility; and greater divergent thinking,
creativity and metalinguistic competence.


WCP Framework for International Languages 3Y Program, 2001
So what?

“A broader range of career choices.”
 Fluency
or business proficiency after 30-level?
 Career choices at HS level?
 Cultural relevance/fluency?
 Primary skills?
 Do
I need to speak German to be an engineer?
Ministerial Paradigm Shift –
Inspiring Education


“Technology should play a broader role in the
classroom.”
Education in Alberta should be guided by the
following principles:
 “Sustainable
and efficient use of resources”
 “Innovation to promote and strive for excellence”
 Maximize opportunity to earn post-sec credit while in
high school

Competencies vs. Knowledge
 Applicable
skills are more valuable than fact recitation
Ministerial Paradigm Shift –
Inspiring Education


So we want students to leave school with skills but:
“Decision-makers should identify and adopt
strategies and structures that optimize resources
(financial and human) and minimize duplication”
 Make
it smart, and cheap
Ministerial Paradigm Shift –
Inspiring Education

We are now, more than ever, under pressure to
ensure maximized ROI for government education
funds.
Advanced Education

“In Alberta, we’re focused on investing in
infrastructure and growing our highly skilled
workforce. By giving the University of Calgary a
new, expanded space for its engineering school, we
can increase the capacity to educate more
engineers who can help us meet our goals and keep
building Alberta.”
 -Premier
Alison Redford, Oct. 9, 2013
Advanced Education

“Our government was elected to keep building Alberta,
to live within its means and to fight to open new
markets for Alberta’s resources.”


Multiple Education and Advanced Education Press Releases
in 2013
“Canada’s western provinces are the economic driver of
our country, and we are looking at unprecedented
opportunities across the region – and those come with
challenges on the skills and labor front.”

Press release following summit of western Canadian
advanced education ministers, September 2013
The Economy of Language

BRICS
 Brazil,
Russia, India, China, South Africa
 Rapidly industrializing, combined $16billion GDP
 Turkey, Indonesia might be added to this list soon.
 Over ¼ of the planet’s land
 Over 40% of the planet’s people
The Economy of Language

BRICS
 The
languages of these countries are emerging as
major business languages, yet some (Portuguese) are
absent from the Alberta POS.
The Economy of Language

Online Business
 ~2
billion people use the internet
 ~74% of content on the web is in English
 ~33% of the people who use the internet read English

This means that the demand for non-English content
will increase
Online Language Use


English = 33% of internet users
Chinese = 27% (and growing)
 https://www.pinterest.com/pin/10414642861388180
/

The rest of the top 10 (total ~20%)
 Spanish,
Japanese, Portuguese, German, Arabic,
French, Russian, Korean

Others: 20%
Localization



AKA “The Language-Service Industry”
Localization is defined by the process through which
a company’s product (usually software or website) is
adapted both linguistically and culturally to be
viable and successful in foreign markets.
#4 most-rapidly growing industry in the US
 $20Billion
USD in 2011
 Common
Sense Advisory
Localization
Localization - Roles





Engineers
Sales/Marketing
Project Managers
Graphic Artists
Translators/Editors/Terminologists
Localization – Tools of the Trade

Computer Assisted Translation (CAT)
 Makes
use of a personal database for
approved/previously translated materials
 Less
cost
 More speed
 Translations
are done by humans (usually)
 Require specialized training to use (aside from
language training)
It looks something like this…..
CAT in the Classroom?

Specialization necessary
 Made
for people with graduate-level training in
translation

Cost prohibitive
 >$5k/yr/license

Alberta currently has no translation skillset
development in any of it’s curriculum
next-step/long-term goal for 21st century
learners?
 Logical
Translation Training in Alberta




There isn’t any!!
Currently, any post-sec training is done in Eastern
Canada
http://www.lexicool.com/courses_canada.asp
Something to have our students aspire to?
Machine Translation Tools

3 types:
 Rules-based
 Stats-based
 Hybrid
In the beginning…… there was an
algorithm

Rules-based translation
A
computational linguist “taught” (programmed) a
computer with grammar rules and vocabulary and the
worst translations imaginable resulted
 Ex.



Systran
Which was then purchased by Yahoo!
and then by Microsoft, subsequently became known as Bing
http://www.bing.com/translator
 (Systran
is still around today, selling hybrids)
Then Google said “let’s let people
search for a ballpark translation”

Stats-based translation
 Programs
“read” translated text and come up with
statistics on how those are translated.
 Requires a large corpora (body of texts)
 Like
the internet, for example
 Remedy
for the Language Teacher’s “Face-palm” has
yet to be discovered
 As more content is added to the internet, these become
more and more accurate
Best of Both Worlds

Hybrid Machine Translation
 Systran
sells these now
 Custom to companies
 Hundreds of thousands to implement ($$$$$)
 Still requires significant corpora
Machine Translation in the Classroom?

Maybe
 Your
novice students will use Google Translate.
 Get
over it.
 Cautionary tales – have a few
 Tell them a few words that will give it away



 If
Tenses they haven’t learned yet (and use perfectly)
Synonyms not learned in class
Wrong meaning/context (though could be dictionary)
they tell you it’s from the dictionary, ask to see it.

So you can get a copy for yourself, obviously
Machine Translation in the Classroom?

At higher levels (or in immersion)
 “Post-editing”
 Very
common practice in language industry
 Requires ability to edit in a language
 Accessible at higher levels in a second language program,
maybe.
 Make
it an assignment
 Pre-author
a text
 Translate it online
 Find the mistakes

If there are any
The grass is…. green

On the next slide, some quick stats about European
K-12 equivalent second language programs
Where to now?

Add new language’s to Alberta Ed’s POS


Portuguese, Korean
Stress importance of post-secondary language training
Translation skills vital for business
 Specialized career paths




Allow for development of cultural competency
Encourage advanced students to use machine translation
prudently, and in controlled situations.
Consider optional status of language courses