UDP Internacional

19 December 2023

On Monday, December 18, 28 members of the UDP community received their certificates for having participated in the language courses that, during this second semester, were taught by institutes specialized in Mandarin Chinese, French, Italian, German and English.

Anoek van den Berg, General Director of International Relations (DGRRII), positively evaluated the closing of this cycle and highlighted the dedication of the students who participated in these instances. “This is the first time that we have such an expanded offer and we have had a very good response, both from the institutes and the students. We were very surprised by the participation in Mandarin Chinese,” she said.

These courses are taught thanks to the discount agreements that the University maintains with external institutions and are part of the actions in the global training axis of the Internationalization Policy of the DGRRII. This offer is also related to the exchange programs available to the community and are developed in order to improve the skills of the staff members. In that sense, students who take these classes can not only learn and perfect a specific language, but also delve into cultural aspects of various countries.

Valentina Palominos, Creative Literature student, who was part of the Italian course, described this experience as “excellent” and highlighted the dedication of her tutor, indicating that, through this guide, she was able to delve deeper into historical, literary, linguistic and cultural of the language.

“I knew almost nothing about the culture and the language, very little. My foundation was Latin, so I took a lot from that to learn Italian. But at one point, I got confused and the teacher helped me a lot. I 100 percent recommend taking this course. It was entertaining and you learned a lot of things,” she said.

In turn, Ignacio Ulloa, who took the French course, commented: “I loved this experience. The teacher explained very well and I learned a lot. It was incredible how, from one moment to the next and despite the fact that there is a rapprochement between French and Spanish, I started watching movies in French or listening to music in French, and I began to understand it in a very short time. She served me and I learned a lot.”

The language courses are taught, thanks to various discount benefits, at the University facilities or at the respective language institutes. Once students advance through the course levels, they can also apply for official certifications.

It should be noted that these instances are open to the entire community, so teachers, students and administrators can register. To participate, it is not necessary to have prior knowledge of languages.

The next call will be launched in March 2024.