Baker students enrolled in a new Summer Session I catalog offering will have an opportunity to brush up on their foreign language skills with the Introduction to Conversational Mandarin Chinese course.

Cynthia Appl, language and literature department chair, had the class brought to her attention after she received an unsolicited e-mail inquiring about the possibility of bringing a Mandarin Chinese class to Baker.

Appl sees the value of learning Chinese in today’s world, which is why she presented the course to faculty senate for approval.

“The new general education program has discussed adding a required universal language course,” Appl said. “If that were to happen, we would be able to branch out in terms of classes offered and with the variety. Chinese would be at the top of the list.”

The idea for this elective class came from Flora Su-Hwa Hsu, who will be teaching the course.

Currently working as a library volunteer, Hsu began her teaching career when she still was living in China at the university she attended. She was in charge of teaching an American professor Chinese. Afterward, she came to America to teach and attend graduate school.

Hsu wanted to teach a class at Baker to provide students the chance to experience this growing language. Also, she believes having knowledge of Mandarin can help students after graduation, in the working world.

“I hope to motivate college students to learn Chinese,” Hsu said. “It is a major language and is useful in conducting international business. Especially after graduation, I really believe there are opportunities and work potential.”

Since this is an introductory course, the main emphasis will be placed on pronunciation and conversations. Other areas that will be covered in the course will be the Pinyin system of phonetics, vocabulary building, grammar study, conversational basics and the development of reading and writing skills.

Freshman Adam Vaughn was interested when he found out about the class because its an important part of his major.

“I am a foreign language major and since Chinese is being used more, it would be good to learn,” he said.

Overall, Hsu is optimistic about the course’s outcome.

“No one is going to be bored,” Hsu said. “We will role play and have a lot of impromptu activities. It will be very interesting.”

The class is from 9:30-10:50 a.m. Monday through Friday, June 1 to June 26.