Grant gives Mandarin classes a shot in the arm..

The Southern Oregon Education Service District has become the latest US institution to offer Mandarin classes, establishing more links in educators' vision of a seamless Chinese language program from the third grade through college.

The district earlier this week was awarded a $600,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Education to provide a Mandarin program for third through eighth grades over a three-year period. Service district officials hope to continue the program after the grant has expired.

"Soon China will be the largest English-speaking country in the world, and look at how many people speak Chinese here," said Jay Matheson, the district's technology coordinator and the Mandarin project director. "We need to build that curiosity about China. If we are dealing with them on a world level, we need people who are curious about their culture and language. We need to get our heads out of the sand."

Instruction will be offered through two-way video conferencing, with much of the grant money going toward installing the necessary equipment at local schools.

Dedicating time to a Chinese program at the elementary level could be a hard sale at some elementary schools because of the national focus on bringing students' skills up to grade level in basic subjects, such as reading and math, and dwindling state financial support. But to reject the Mandarin program on that basis is short-sighted, Matheson said.

"Studying another language really enhances the study of your own language," Matheson said, "and it's a great motivator for students."

The district's vision is to eventually expand the Mandarin program so that students could attend classes without interruption from the third to 12th grades and then go on to Southern Oregon University in Ashland or another university and continue studying the language, Matheson said.

SOU recently announced it will launch a beginning Mandarin program Sept. 28 when classes resume.

Medford's St. Mary's School, which began the county's first Mandarin program in fall 2006, will lend one of its three Chinese instructors to both SOU and the service district.

Last year, the private Catholic secondary school became the first high school in the Americas to become a Confucius Classroom through the Hanban Chinese Language Council International's Confucius Institute program in China. The program provides instructors from China to teach Mandarin at the school and makes Chinese educational and travel activities available to students, often for free.

"Part of the mission of the Confucius Classroom is to spread Chinese culture and language studies," said Frank Phillips, St. Mary's head of school. "Part of (the decision to share the school's Chinese teachers) is a good neighbor policy. Funding is down for public education, and Chinese is an important language."

By the end of the three years, the service district hopes to have recruited 25 schools to offer the Mandarin classes and to have enrolled 1,875 pupils.