We, the undersigned, including students, staff, parents, and alumni of Amsterdam University College, are aware of the ongoing discussion of “abandoning the language requirement.” With this in mind, we call upon AUC’s management and leadership to stand against this plan and argue for the value of the study of language and culture at AUC.

From the start, the AUC language program has been integral to our Liberal Arts and Science curriculum. . We believe that dismissing the importance of language learning by making languages an elective subject would be a mistake. It will impact students' Master's and Ph.D. applications, limit future job prospects, and make them less able citizens of the world.

Why should we continue to require two Language courses in the AUC curriculum? 

1. Language courses help students develop multicultural insight, linguistic skills, and mental agility. Students might learn Dutch to integrate in the Netherlands, Spanish or French grammar to understand English grammar, or Chinese and Arabic to learn the semantic complexity of ideographic writing. 

2. Language courses add to the diversity at AUC, in line with AUC's FAPDEI aims and ideals.

3. Language courses help students to develop their intercultural skills. Students evaluate and compare cultural practices and perspectives to work towards intercultural competence. 

4. Foreign language study creates more positive attitudes and less prejudice toward people who are different.  

5. Offering language courses is in tune with the Epicur project; Epicur promotes language learning as pivotal for students' further careers in the European Union.

6. Foreign language study enhances education, government, business, medicine, law, technology, tourist industry, marketing, and more.

7. Most AUC students already speak more than one language; however, they do not read or write in these languages. Certification of competence in a language will facilitate their applications for an international program at the BA or MA levels. 

8. Acquiring a B2 reading comprehension level in a foreign language grants students access to other scientific communities and epistemologies.

9. The ability to speak different languages, even at an intermediate level, trains the mind to solve puzzles and think about the world from multiple perspectives and linguistic frameworks. 

10.  The recently submitted (October 2021) EDI project 'Language and Culture at Amsterdam University College,' carried out by language coordinators and instructors, speaks to the study of culture that is now fully integrated into the languages.