I recently observed a lecture to Utah high school students on mexicanidad, the question of what constitutes Mexican identity. In the ensuing discussion, students raised ideas that were thoughtful, complex — and expressed entirely in Spanish. But it wasn’t only their language skills that were impressive. Their grasp of the nuance of the material was just as sophisticated.
Perhaps the most extraordinary thing is that this scenario is altogether commonplace in Utah high schools — and not just in Spanish, but in Chinese, French, German and Portuguese. Approximately 5,000 Utah high school students will have similar experiences this year as part of the Bridge Program for Advanced Language Learning.
As many states across the country face declining public confidence in higher education, Utah stands out as a leader in establishing partnerships between its public universities and the community to prepare students for a global workforce. One of our most striking feats of innovation is the collaboration between state universities and local school districts to graduate students with advanced language proficiency through our Dual Language Immersion Program for grades K–9 and the state-of-the-art Bridge Program for Advanced Language Learning for grades 10–12.
Pioneering programs like these inevitably face obstacles. Some sites are more difficult to staff than others. Bridge has weathered its share of budget scares. It also frequently faces calls to lower teacher qualification standards and thereby dilute course rigor, which would have an adverse effect on the outcomes students and parents in the state have been promised.
But I can tell you this: The Bridge Program is working. In addition to my 12 years at the University of Utah, I have taught classes made up entirely of returned LDS missionaries at BYU. I have taught advanced courses at Harvard and at Middlebury College’s renowned Language Immersion Program. I have taught upper-level language to cadets while on the faculty of the United States Military at West Point. Our Bridge students are the peers of every one of these groups.
The first cohort of Bridge students arrived on university campuses in 2021. After three years of having these students in our classes at the University of Utah, it is thrilling to see the first wave of results take shape:
Bridge students have achieved a cumulative GPA of 3.59 in upper-level (3000+) language courses in my department, compared to a GPA of 3.47 for all other students — a group that includes both former LDS missionaries and native speakers.
Spanish Bridge students perform particularly well, achieving a half letter grade higher (3.71, A-) than their non-Bridge counterparts (3.45, B+).
How did we accomplish this? Most Utahns are familiar with the state’s visionary, award-winning K-9 Dual Language Immersion Program. It is widely recognized as the finest program of its kind in the nation, both in terms of size and quality.
What truly sets Utah apart, though, has been the creation of the Bridge Program, which was founded through a collective effort that included everyone from high school teachers to university administrators. It maximizes language immersion students’ investment by facilitating their transition to college. Bridge students enroll in upper-level university language courses via concurrent enrollment beginning in their sophomore year of high school.
The curricula for these courses were developed by statewide university faculty committees and transfer to degree programs at every public university in Utah. Students are immersed in literature, cinema, pop culture and history from countries around the world, discussing and analyzing them in their original language.
To make this possible, the Bridge Program maintains higher teacher qualification standards and greater university department involvement than traditional concurrent enrollment classes. Students graduate from high school not only with advanced language skills, but also with upper-level university credits toward a major or minor. For some students, Bridge even helps them see — for the first time in their lives — that college is a real possibility.
This is a remarkable achievement, shared by all the public universities and schools in Utah’s language immersion ecosystem. Bridge validates University of Utah President Taylor Randall’s campaign to make the U a top ten public university in social impact. When it comes to language immersion, Bridge is not just top 10, it is top one. Its excellence and innovative nature, coupled with its direct service to the people of this state, make it a shining example of what the U and all our public universities have to offer the community.
While not all Bridge students choose to enroll at the U or even attend college in Utah, this in no way lessens the program’s impact. Language skills and cultural competency at such an advanced level broaden job opportunities and increase salaries no matter one’s chosen path after high school. This cuts across every sector, from the diplomatic corps to AI development to engineering abroad. Bridge prepares ambassadors from Utah to the world as well as contributes to attracting investment and new businesses to our state by expanding its multilingual workforce.
The University of Utah remains committed to upholding the high standards and strict instructor qualifications that have made the Bridge Program such a success. It is a testament to what can be achieved when Utah’s government, institutions of higher education and K-12 schools partner for the betterment of our future.
(Christopher T. Lewis) Christopher T. Lewis is an associate professor of Portuguese and is the chair of the Department of World Languages & Cultures at the University of Utah.
Christopher T. Lewis is an associate professor of Portuguese and is the chair of the Department of World Languages & Cultures at the University of Utah.
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