04/20/2007 - 04/21/2007

Multilingual.com release new guide to Internationalization

Multilingual.com have just posted their new publication, "Internationalization". The guide is a must read for anyone interested in multilingual website design or localization.

Speak Dutch or be fired

A Belgian auto parts supplier has forbidden its workers to speak any language other than Dutch, even during their lunch break, and employees could be fired if they disobey.

"We have people from Italy, India, Poland, Algeria here. It's to avoid cliques forming here and there," said Geert Vermote, human resources manager of HP Pelzer in the town of Genk in Belgium's Dutch-speaking Flanders region.

BiasHELP's Landmark Diversity DVD

In the midst of a spirited national debate about racially inappropriate comments made by Don Imus, BiasHELP has stepped-up distribution of its "Mirror Images" diversity training DVD series. The series, which serves as the centerpiece for diversity training at dozens of corporations, universities, non-profits and health care facilities nationwide, offers unique first-person perspectives on race as well as on ethnicity, religion and sexual orientation. Produced on Long Island, "Mirror Images" features both young people and older Americans discussing their experiences and juxtaposing the challenges of today with the challenges of yesterday, while united in their hope for the future.

Enrollment Management: Technology and Diversity Practices in the News

Enrollment Management divisions of colleges and universities, and Enrollment Management Consultants alike. Increasingly, college admissions officers are turning to technology in order to accomplish the task of attracting and retaining prospective students.

In the news, we've seen recent headlines that focus on Enrollment Management topics such as: the recent trend in State funding of higher education; the promotion of distance learning initiatives; performance based funding policies; and how colleges and universities seek to bolster socio-economic diversity among students, by promoting different admissions procedures.

Foreign language learning and the UK pig industry

Foreign language training guidelines, a new scheme striving for consistent pork quality and a ‘confidence survey’ – those are the three latest projects from the British Pig Executive (BPEX).

The training guidelines have been designed to help pig farmers overcome the initial language problems when employing new staff from eastern Europe. They are available in four languages – Lithuanian, Russian, Romanian and Polish – and cover food and water, handling and moving pigs, restraining pigs, sick pig management, hygiene, useful words and slap marking.

Language barriers, inability to adjust cause stress to foreign students

Language barriers and the inability to adjust to living in Singapore are the two main causes of stress for foreign students. University counsellors said these issues usually occur during the early phase of their move to Singapore. And if these issues are not dealt with at the onset, it may lead to severe depression and loneliness.

Word of the Day: impugn

impugn \im-PYOON\, transitive verb:
To attack by words or arguments; to call in question; to make insinuations against; to oppose or challenge as false; to gainsay.

As might be expected of fanatical flag idolaters, the GAR did not accept refusals lightly, and in one instance in Illinois impugned the patriotic loyalty of recalcitrant local school administrators by spreading rumors that one of them was a foreign alien yet to be naturalized and the other a draft dodger who evaded Civil War service by fleeing to Canada. -- Albert Boime, The Unveiling of the National Icons