Language Bridges returns to CMU-Q

Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar (CMU-Q), a Qatar Foundation partner university, has relaunched Language Bridges, an educational program to improve the English language skills of service workers.

The program was originally developed by Silvia Pessoa, teaching professor of English at CMU-Q and area co-head of arts and sciences, in 2009. Under Pessoa’s mentorship, a student-led group organized and taught the program for several years. Language Bridges was paused during the pandemic, but has now been relaunched as part of CMU-Q’s EcoCampus initiative.

Elissar El-Akra Hajjar is director of facilities at CMU-Q and co-chair of EcoCampus. “To earn our green flag designation, one of the areas we decided to focus on was equity for our entire community.”

The Language Bridges program teaches introductory, conversational English to speakers of other languages.

As director of facilities, Hajjar coordinates the many service workers who are integral to the operations of the CMU-Q building. “Many of our service workers are new to Qatar and we realized some cannot speak either English or Arabic. Language Bridges is an excellent first step to improve their work experience.”

CMU-Q’s EcoCampus is working toward earning the FEE green flag designation by following a structured plan to improve sustainability. Originally started in 2020 by a group of faculty, students and staff and led by Chadi Aoun, teaching professor of information systems, EcoCampus has been gathering momentum since the campus resumed normal operations, post-pandemic. The EcoCampus initiative is led by the Foundation for Environmental Education (FEE). Qatar Foundation’s Earthna is the national operator in Qatar.

Hajjar and Rosemarie Florida, facilities operations administrator at CMU-Q, taught Language Bridges this summer with five service workers. The program will continue when the new academic year begins in August.