The application for the U. S. Department of State’s 2025 Critical Language Scholarship (CLS) Program and CLS Spark virtual initiative is now open! We welcome your students to apply this year to learn a critical language on a funded overseas or virtual summer program.
Through the CLS Program, U.S. undergraduate and graduate students spend eight to ten weeks over the summer studying one of a dozen critical languages: Arabic, Chinese, Hindi, Indonesian, Japanese, Korean, Persian, Portuguese, Russian, Swahili, Turkish, and Urdu. The program is designed to promote rapid language gains through intensive language instruction, host community engagement, and structured cultural activities in a cohort-based setting.
Additionally, the CLS Spark virtual initiative provides beginner-level virtual instruction in Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Russian, as well as advanced beginner-level Japanese. Applicants for CLS Spark must be undergraduate students and preference will be given to applicants from institutions where these languages aren’t offered.
To learn more about the eligibility for the CLS Program and CLS Spark, please visit: https://clscholarship.org/applicants/eligibility. The application deadline is 8:00 pm Eastern Standard Time on Tuesday, November 19, 2024.
Our team will be hosting webinars and alumni panels over the coming weeks to provide more detail and answer questions. You can find the full event schedule and registration links here: https://clscholarship.org/events.
If you have any questions, please contact the CLS Program team at: cls@americancouncils.org.