For over a decade, Harmony School and Indiana University (IU) have partnered through the after-school program, Bridges: Children, Language, World.

According to Bridges Program Coordinator, Bill Rozycki, the program  began in 2004 at IU through support from the US Office of Education.

“The goal is to spark an interest in language learning, and specifically the learning of less-commonly taught languages and the culture associated with their speakers, among elementary school students and other young learners,” Rozycki said.

The program supports the sending of volunteer instructors, who are generally studying the language, into local schools around Monroe County. Over the last two years, ten IU students have instructed at Harmony offering Chinese, Greek and Persian classes in an after-school setting once a week.

According to Rozycki, the benefits of the Bridges program are universal, impacting Harmony’s students, the IU student volunteer instructors, and ultimately the greater community as a whole.

“Sparking an interest in a language (other than the commonly-taught languages Spanish, French, German, and Italian) brings a benefit to all involved,” Rozycki said. “The young students gain some familiarity with a new language that may lead them to pursue its study at a more rigorous level in the future; the volunteer instructors get real world experience in teaching a language they are studying; and the nation creates a training ground for a budding group of citizens who have expertise needed for commercial, diplomatic, military, and intelligence applications that strengthen the United States in its dealings with the diverse nations and language communities of the world.”

While the Bridges program plans one semester at a time due to school and volunteer instructor schedules, Rozycki said he hopes that the program returns to Harmony in 2025.

“As I supervise the teaching of Greek, Chinese, and Persian at Harmony, I am heartened to see the excitement as children communicate in a new language and learn about cultures that  would not likely affect them were it not for Bridges,” Rozycki said.