Intensive English Program educates, assists international students

To help bolster international presence at IU, the Intensive English Program helps assimilate students from around the world into American culture on campus.

Students of all backgrounds and languages learn or improve their English through the programs offered at IEP prior to beginning their collegiate studies.

Program director Marlin Howard said there are currently 280 students from 23 countries in the program, many of whom are from the Middle East.

To join IEP, students must have finished high school and be at least 18 years old. Students admitted to the IEP take an exam that places them in one of the seven levels of the program, each lasting seven weeks.

“Students in IEP are studying English full-time,” Howard said, adding that students spend 20 to 25 hours a week in English-only classes that focus on communication, reading, writing and grammar.

Students join IEP to better their English for various reasons, Howard said.  Not all students who go through IEP continue on to IU, he said, but many students
stay nearby.

“Most students who plan to go into their undergraduate stay in the Midwest because it’s perceived as safer and is less expensive than the coasts,” he said.

Binghui Niu, a recent high school graduate from China, is currently enrolled in IEP to improve her English skills before she begins courses at IU.

“I think it has already improved a little in just two weeks,” Niu, who is in level four of the program, said of her English.

Niu said she did have some background knowledge from studying English in China, but it was not very helpful.

“Our English is not very good, and the teacher’s pronunciation is not very good,” Niu said.

Niu, who plans to study finance at the Kelley School of Business, said this is her first time in America, but she is adjusting well, particularly with help from services IEP offers, like coffee hour.

The weekly coffee hour gives students a chance to socialize with one another and practice their English in a casual setting.

Hany Alsalmi, a graduate student in the School of Library and Information Science who completed IEP last summer, attributed his success in the program to the coffee hour.

Alsalmi said a little more than a year in the program has helped him greatly.

“When I got to the U.S., I could not speak English really good,” he said. “I had some friends who would translate for me.”