SCHUYLKILL HAVEN - Next month Penn State Schuylkill will begin offering its first Chinese language course in conjunction with Blue Mountain Area High School.
Mary J. Sacavage, director of continuing education at Penn State Schuylkill, said Friday that the program was the brainchild of Blue Mountain school board President Mary Jo Moss and Superintendent Robert Urzillo.
There will be three sessions all at the local college campus, which the first two sessions are geared towards elementary students and the third is a normal college course not only for Penn State Schuylkill students, but also qualifying high school juniors and seniors.
"They'll be doing language, culture, song and role play activities," Sacavage said.
The instructor is Niu Xiaomei, a Chinese instructor at Albright College, Reading, who has her M.A. in Comparative Literature from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.
"They (Blue Mountain) approached us and asked if we'd do an elementary education program, but we wanted to do something for the high school students too," Sacavage said.
The first session for K-8 runs March 12 through May 16 and will be offered Tuesday and Thursday afternoons from 4 to 6 p.m.
Sacavage said another two-week session for grades 3 to 8 will be offered as part of the campus "Kid's College" from 9 a.m. to noon from July 8 through July 19.
"We expanded it even more and looked for something that could expand the needs of high school students," she said.
The four-credit class will run Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday evenings from June 26 to Aug. 11 and will be open to college students and eligible high school juniors and seniors.
"I hope to make it a regular program. It just depends on the interest," Sacavage said.