National Language Service Corps Exceeds 1,000 Charter Members
September 16, 2009 --The National Language Service Corps (NLSC) has announced that it has successfully recruited 1,000 Charter Members into its pilot program. During its pilot stage, the NLSC is recruiting U.S. citizens with skills in English and one of ten other languages: Mandarin Chinese, Russian, Thai, Vietnamese, Indonesian and Marshallese, Swahili, Somali and Hausa.
Dr. Robert Slater, Director, National Security Education Program, believes that achieving the 500 Charter Member benchmark speaks more broadly of the character of Americans, stating “It’s quite remarkable to think how far we’ve come in such a short time. Our Members demonstrate the spirit of service in this country.” Slater also expressed enthusiasm about the scope of the organization’s mission, adding,“We feel that the NLSC can fill a valuable role in supporting agencies at all levels of government in response to unexpected temporary demands for language skills.”
The purpose of the pilot program is testing and evaluating all aspects of the NLSC, including advertising, recruiting, training, Member assignment, and the logistics of transporting members to and from assignment locations. NLSC assignments during the pilot are with a select group of Federal agencies, both civilian and Department of Defense. Recent NLSC exercises with the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta, GA reinforced both the value of having members whose primary motivation is a sense of service and the onsite support that the NLSC model focuses on providing.
The NLSC has used a full range of conventional and new social networking advertising and promotional venues to recruit the Charter Members but has found that the appeal of the NSLC vision has resulted in referrals by members and others to be a significant source of new members.
The NLSC projects that, once it is fully operational, its membership could grow to over 30,000 individuals with certified skills in more than 150 languages.
About the National Language Service Corps
The NLSC is a group of multilingual individuals that make themselves available to serve their country in the event of a sudden need for their language skills. They are united by the fundamental belief that language has a tremendous impact on who we are; who we can be; and what we can do together. In addition to making a significant and worthwhile contribution to the nation and its language communities, Members become part of a unique language network of service-minded individuals. All Members currently must be U.S. Citizens who are at least 18 years or older, possess language expertise and have a genuine desire to help their fellow language communities. Additional information about the National Language Service Corps is available at nlscorps.org.
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