School for Foreign Students: Spanish language and culture courses

The School for Foreign Students (EEE) of the Universidad Veracruzana is part of the Dirección General de Relaciones Internacionales. The mission of the EEE, found in 1957, is to promote the enrichment of the international dimension of the UV through its academic offer Spanish as a Foreign Language, Mexican and Latin America Culture courses, Programs for International Students and Special Programs, among others. The EEE, with its long tradition in meeting the academic and social needs of foreign students, offers you the opportunity to improve your Spanish and learn about Latin American culture. Our school gives you a first-class academic program tailored to meet your individual needs, as well as an enriching cultural environment, plus a small town Mexican atmosphere. The activities of the EEE are centered in Xalapa, the capital city of Veracruz. With a population of more than 500,000, Xalapa is home of the main campus of the University, which has four other campuses in different parts of the state. The EEE offers six levels of Spanish. Students take an online placement test or presencial oral test, and then they are assigned to the level best suited their needs. In addition to Spanish language courses, you may also study Mexican History, History of Art in Mexico and Archaeology. We are specialist in caring for the needs of students for whom Spanish is a heritage language, and who wish to develop their linguistic and cultural skills. One-to-one conversation, cultural immersion tutorials and independent study courses or special group courses can be arranged on request. Out-of-town tours for the EEE students are available during the Summer or for Special Programs, for example, a visit to El Tajín, combined with a beach weekend on the sands of Veracruz. The Universidad Veracruzana is a member of the Association of International Educators (NAFSA), and of the Mexican Association for International Education (AMPEI) and The European Association for International Education (EAIE).

Courses

The School for Foreign Students, during Spring and Autumn terms, offers a two-weeks course called Spanish Express Contact for those students that need an intensive course before starting the semester. During each semester the school offers six language courses, applied language courses and content courses. During the semester, Spanish levels are divided into two modules of 50 hours each. Students can attend courses in both modules according to their level. Regarding the applied language and content courses, students should take into account the curriculum to know what courses they can take according to their level. Some content courses are offered in English for those students that still don’t master the language but are interested in them. In Summer, there are six language levels offered with their six workshops and content courses that last for six weeks. Our courses are available for everyone during all the academic terms.

Courses Map

Language Courses:

The goal of our six Spanish courses is to develop holistic linguistic skills, on the basis of the appropriate grammar and practical contents corresponding to each level of proficiency. Also, we have five Spanish Workshops (mainly with oral and writing activities) to support the Spanish courses mentioned above. Spanish I:

• Total: 50 hours/ 5 credits

This course is planned according to the students’ needs; hence, it seeks to provide students with basic tools for them to relate to their new environment at an elemental level as well as to approach them to the culture. This way, students start acquiring Spanish by developing the four linguistic skills. Spanish II:

• Total: 50 hours/ 5 credits

In this course, students will develop their skills so as to be able to express their ideas, opinions, and exchange them using both oral and written production. Spanish III:

• Total: 50 hours/ 5 credits

Studying Spanish as a foreign language involves an educational reality that requires a methodology that encompasses the possibility of achieving proposed goals in the definition of teaching objectives, material selection and activities to be carried out as well as in the evaluation method and all resources through which students acquire the communicative proficiency in the target language. This course intends to help students learn Spanish in an integral way, considering that any language is basically a communication tool. Spanish IV:

• Total: 50 hours/ 5 credits

The objective of this course is to reinforce the grammar aspects acquired in the previous level. It involves improving the ability to speak about the past, even considering some complex aspects; making emphasis on the subjunctive mood, especially referring to the past; and, finally, increasing the ability to talk about what other people do, think, want, wish or feel. Spanish V:

• Total: 50 hours/ 5 credits

This course contemplates the necessity and convenience for foreign students to polish their communicative skills so as to understand, speak, read and write the language of our culture, focusing on Mexican Spanish, but also considering other Spanish varieties. Furthermore, the course takes into account all grammatical knowledge acquired in the previous levels as a theoretical supporting element for better language proficiency. Spanish VI:

• Total: 50 hours/ 5 credits

Español VI is for advanced Spanish learners. It gives them the opportunity to perfect their oral, writing and reading skills in order for students to be able to efficiently communicate in Spanish Spanish for Specific Purposes – Business:

• Total: 50 hours/ 5 credits

Teaching Spanish for Specific Purposes consists on training students on the use of the appropriate language according to the professional situation in which they develop. Through this course, students will practice skills and necessary strategies pertaining to the area of businesses in order to be able to communicate in a concrete situation, through the understanding and knowledge of specific vocabulary. This course is for students with a high intermediate, advanced and proficiency level. Spanish Express Contact:

• 30 hrs. total / 3 credits

This course has a communicative focus with the purpose of helping students to practice speaking, writing, listening and reading in an every-day-life environment. The objective is to provide students with the linguistic fluency they need for the first days of their stay in our country. The course is offered in three levels: beginners, intermediate and advanced. Spanish Individual Program: The Spanish Individual Program offers the benefits of a private course that adapts itself to the student’s level and Spanish learning needs. Students can choose the schedule according to their convenience. The program can be hired with a minimum of five hours, and grants credits from 20 hours = 2 credits, 30 hours = 3 credits and so on. This course is for students with an intermediate, high intermediate, advanced and proficiency level.

Applied Language Courses:

Oral Expression in Spanish I: This course seeks for the student to develop a communicative ability to identify the sounds of Spanish language in the daily use, as well as the acquisition and use of specific popular expressions and a larger vocabulary. This course is for students with low intermediate and intermediate level. Oral Expression in Spanish II: The aim of this course is to help students to learn how to express themselves fluently and correctly in Spanish through the practice of communicative and grammatical points in real contexts. It seeks for the students to acquire and develop communicative strategies that will help them to make a better use of Spanish and know about customs, traditions and expression from the culture where they are immersed now. This course is for students with a high intermediate, advanced and proficiency level. Written Expression in Spanish I: This course is addressed to students who wish to improve their Spanish writing ability. The main objective is for students to exercise this ability using grammatically appropriate resources in order to get a better proficiency in this activity and be able to create descriptive, narrative, and expositive short texts that can be coherent, with the minimum of spelling, grammatical and vocabulary mistakes possible. This course is for students with low intermediate and intermediate level. Written Expression in Spanish II: This course is based on the continuing writing practice with the purpose of providing students with enough elements to communicate in written Spanish. It seeks for the student to learn not just techniques to develop this skill but also a global knowledge of the language and the world it represents. This course is for students with a high intermediate, advanced and proficiency level. Spanish Grammar I: Studying Spanish grammar will let the student know and understand how the language structures work, so that he/she achieves a correct, precise and creative communication in this language. In this grammar course the student will become familiar with the vocabulary and will use the rules for combining words in sentence developing, at the same time, the listening, reading, writing and speaking skills. This course is for students with low intermediate and intermediate level. Spanish Grammar II: The aim of this course is for the students to increase their grammatical knowledge and to apply it to the development of the communicative abilities: listening, reading, speaking and writing. This course will help student to be able to express agreement, disagreement, doubts, invite the listener to make hypothesis, express probability, recognize and use speech markers, etc. This course is for students with a high intermediate, advanced and proficiency level. Translation English – Spanish: It is a workshop where students have the opportunity to reaffirm their Spanish knowledge, acquire vocabulary from different areas of knowledge in its own context, compare grammatical aspects of both English and Spanish and put them into practice when translating. This course will provide students with techniques on reading, writing and translation, as well as features of compared grammar (English and Spanish) that will be useful for them to solve problems when translating. This course is for students with a high intermediate, advanced and proficiency level. Spanish Pronunciation: The aim of this course is for the students to reflect about language production in general and to know the phonologic and phonetic systems in Spanish. Students should compare this to their mother tongue’s system so that they understand the phenomenon of sound production, improving their pronunciation and the acquisition of useful tools for language teaching in general. This course is for students with low intermediate, intermediate, high intermediate, advanced and proficiency level.

Content Courses:

Mexican Contemporary Literature: This course deals with the development of Mexican literature during the XX century. We will view this development since the perspectives of continuity and rupture. The course sets short stories in the context of the historic process of Mexico. Some of the authors we will read areMariano Azuela, José Revueltas, Juan Rulfo, Carlos Fuentes, Elena Poniatowska, etc. This course is for students with a high intermediate, advanced and proficiency level. Topics of the Contemporary Mexican Life: Mexico is one of the countries that are made up by a cultural diversity. This diversity includes all the ethnic groups and the rural and urban societies. The main purpose of this course is for students to learn about institutional structures of Mexican cultures (social, political, economic, religious, and educational). Students will learn concepts about their origins, development, ways of functioning and their effects on national projects. Some of the topics the course will deal with are cultural diversity, Mexican social problems, cultural institutions, national project, Mexican folklore and identities. This course is for students with a high intermediate, advanced and proficiency level. Náhuatl: The objective of this course is to provide students with the necessary tools to get a first approach to Náhuatl language. Besides Náhuatl classes, this course includes a visit to a native community where this language is spoken, so students will have the opportunity to practice what they have learnt in a real environment. This course is for students with an intermediate, high intermediate, advanced and proficiency level. Photography: This course is designed to help students understand basic photography notions and put them into practice. Photography will be addressed as an art. Students will learn how to use 35mm cameras, how to judge a picture’s composition and lighting and how to develop and print black and white photos. Mexican Culture and Civilizations: This course will review the social and cultural diversity that builds up Mexico, going through the different influences that have transformed the native cultures. With the aim of providing students with a general knowledge about the cultural process in Mexico that allows them to set in a context, their intercultural experience in this country, the course approaches Mexican representative artistic manifestations pertaining to the high class culture and to the popular one. Some of the topics this course deals with are ancient Mexican cultures, the colonial period, religious festivities, Pre-Hispanic muralism, topics related to the mixture of races, native ethnic groups, etc. This course is for students with a high intermediate, advanced and proficiency level. Prehispanic Civilizations:

• Offered in English

The program of this course concerns with a long period of time which begins when small groups of hunters and gatherers from the center and north of Asia; behind the pleistocene fauna, arrives to the American continent, and finished with the fall of Aztec Empire, by hands of his enemies, ruled by Hernán Cortés in 1521. The students will increase their knowledge on the Ancient Civilizations of America thinking them as part of the history of the mankind. This knowledge can be useful in the understanding of the current sociocultural diversity. Mexican Culture and Civilization:

• Offered in English

The course will try to highlight the most important facts and processes along almost five centuries of history. The course will focus on the evolution of the main social groups that inhabited Mexico, that is to say ethnic groups, Black population and Spaniards. We will underline the ethnic groups participation during different periods of time and their relation with the Mestizos (Mixed populations) and the official Government until today. We will finish the course analyzing the ethnic participation in the Zapatist movement after 1994 and how the Mexican politics, economy and government have changed since then. Doing Business in Mexico:

• Offered in English

The objective of this course is that students know the real Mexican business environment, such as the problems of the Mexican companies, the new free trade agreements signed by Mexico, the programs offered by the Government to support Mexican companies and finally the customs to make business in Mexico.

Applied Language Courses:

Independent Study Program: The Independent Study Program offers the benefits of a private course on any topic related to the cultural, social, scientific or artistic field of the Spanish speaking world that can be of interest to the student for academic reasons. Students can choose the schedule according to their convenience. The program can be offered for a minimum of five hours, and grants credits from 20 hours = 2 credits, 30 hours = 3 credits and so on. This course is for students with a high intermediate, advanced and proficiency level. General University Courses: Those students with the appropriate level of Spanish will have the opportunity to select courses from the different undergraduate and graduate programs of the Universidad Veracruzana’s Facultades (schools), according to their needs and academic profile. The University Courses selection is subject to the courses and room available, and to the Faculties acceptance. General University Courses provide the student with the opportunity to develop their linguistic and cultural immersion skills through the student’s integration to the university’s student community in Xalapa. These courses are for students with a high intermediate, advanced and proficiency level. Internship Program: Its aim is to ease and coordinate the foreign student’s work who wishes to assist through a service of internship in a local entity. Students can choose to carry out this program within these areas: health, education, business and ecology. The Internship Program seeks for the student to have the opportunity to understand the organization and structure of a Mexican institution. This course is for students with a high intermediate, advanced and proficiency level.

Admissions

• A completed Application form.pdf.
• International (non-refundable) administrative fees of $100 USD are applicable.
• A photograph of yourself in jpg format, 480 wide x 640 high pixels.
• A selection of Courses UV, courses semester EEE or intesive summer UV is available according to your level of Spanish at EEE.
• A photocopy of your valid Passport.
• Certificate of good health.
• Proof of your travel insurance.
• Latest transcript provided by your university (if you need credits).
• A letter of recommendation from your university.
• Résumé / Brief CV.
• Proof of financial support (except for special programs and intensive Summer sections).
• Homestay Program page.
• Cultural Immersion Program.pdf Form.
• A photocopy of your Student visa or tourist card you will receive on entry to Mexico.
• On arrival, International officers at UV will guide you through the Immigration registration requirement.

Send all your documents via express mail to the following address and a PDF copy to our e-mail: academica_eee@uv.mx

Deadlines:

• Once you have given all necessary documents, you will get an official receipt and a letter of acceptance from Universidad Veracruzana.
• We recommend you send your application and fee as early as possible.
• The student must hand in a photocopy of their FM3 visa or a photocopy of the corresponding procedure in the INM (National Institute of Immigration).
• Admissions are open at the beginning of each session.

Admissions are open at the beginning of each session / semester. Deadlines for registering to Spanish courses at the EEE are:

• Spring: January 26, 2015
• Summer: May 18, 2015
• Fall: August 17, 2015

Note: All your documents must be in your record by these dates; otherwise, Admissions office will not be able to carry out your official subscription.