Department of State April 10, 2008 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The Office of Citizen Exchange Programs of the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs announces an open competition for projects in support of the National Security Language Initiative (NSLI) to provide short, medium, and/or long-term foreign language instruction and cultural immersion programs overseas for American high school students and those who have just graduated. Public and private non-profit organizations, or consortia of such organizations meeting the provisions described in Internal Revenue Code section 26 U.S.C. 501(c)(3), may submit proposals to implement these programs in countries where the following target languages are widely spoken: Arabic, Chinese, Korean, Russian, Turkish, Indic, and Farsi. Programs will be designed for U.S. citizens aged 15 to 18 at the start of the program who are either currently enrolled in high school or have just graduated. These programs should offer at least 550 U.S. high school students structured classroom instruction and less formal interactive learning opportunities through a comprehensive exchange experience that primarily emphasizes language learning. The program is designed to develop additional language study opportunities for U.S. students. Proposals from applicant organizations should clearly indicate the building of new, additional institutional language- teaching capacity overseas for these programs. ECA plans to award a single grant for the recruitment and administration of all NSLI-Y programs in all world regions. The Bureau expects that most students will be placed in host families, but will consider alternative housing arrangements, such as dormitories. Alternative arrangements must include adult resident daily supervision and be combined with brief home stays. In either case, the student must be ensured his or her own bed. The exchange programs will take place between January 2009 and December 2010, and we anticipate that recruitment and planning will begin during the summer/early fall of 2008. The program builds on two years of short (summer-only) intensive language programs in Arabic and Chinese conducted in 2006 and 2007. Information on these programs is available at the NSLI Youth Web site: https://www.exchanges.state.gov/education/citizens/students/ programs/nsli.htm.

The Cultural Programs Division of the Office of Citizen Exchanges, in the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs announces an open competition for grants to implement programs that utilize the arts to engage civil societyparticularly youth and diverse and underserved populationsand that foster linkages and build partnerships between U.S. and overseas non-profit arts and cultural organizations, and local communities. These international arts exchange projects will encourage democracy building by demonstrating opportunities for freedom of thought and expression and by underscoring the importance of empowerment in an open society. The Bureau anticipates that approximately 1,250,000 will be available to support this competition. ECA/PE/C/CU expects to fund approximately two to four projects under this competition in FY-2008. Public and non-profit arts and cultural organizations meeting the provisions described in Internal Revenue code section 26 U.S.C. 501(c)(3) may submit proposals that support the goals of the Arts Exchanges on International Issues Program. As applicable, programs should include two-way exchanges of participants from the U.S. and foreign countries. Proposed projects should transform institutional and individual understanding of key international, arts and/or cultural issues, foster dialogue, develop professional expertise and develop leadership capacity. Through these people-to-people exchanges, the Bureau seeks to reach out to young people, counter negative perceptions, promote good governance, contribute to conflict prevention and management, and build respect for cultural expression and identity in the world. Projects should be structured to encourage American professionals and their international counterparts in eligible countries to develop a common dialogue for dealing with shared challenges and concerns. The Bureau is especially interested in engaging socially and economically diverse groups that may not have had extensive contact with counterpart institutions in the United States. Applicants may only submit one proposal under this open competition. An applicant may not include in its project proposal countries not eligible under each specific theme as designated in the RFGP. Proposals that contain countries that are not listed under each theme in the RFGP will be considered technically ineligible, and will not receive further consideration in the review process. For this competition, all eligible organizations must demonstrate a minimum of five years' experience successfully conducting international arts exchange programs that involved the exchange of participants. The Bureau is interested in receiving proposals from organizations with a strong interest, thematic expertise, institutional commitment and a successful track-record in conducting international exchanges. We welcome proposals from organizations that have not previously received ECA funding. Organizations that have the expertise, interest and institutional commitment but lack the required experience of conducting exchanges may wish to consider developing proposals based on consortia- type relationships with more experienced, eligible organizations. Please note that for these proposals, the role of each organization must be clearly defined and any sub-granting agreements must be included in the proposal submission.