Audio-visual equipment and computers have been added to the Foreign Language Center in anticipation of employment trends and the creation of a master’s degree program.

Marilyn Skinner, chairwoman of the department of foreign language and literature, said the language department hopes to implement the program by the fall 1988 semester or in 1989.

D. Raymond Tourville, coordinator of the foreign language residence program, said students and faculty studying languages can use “state-of-the-art” computers and audio-visual equipment.

The center houses study carrels equipped with cassette players, a leisure area for informal study, a computer and audio-visual section and an audio-visual room that seats 20 people. About 125 people can use the center at any given time, Tourville said.

Through using the center, students can develop the skills necessary to work at technologically advanced corporations, Skinner said.

“It’s not enough for students to be trained in languages in order to work in the field in the 21st century. (Through working on modern equipment) our students will be prepared for jobs,” Skinner said.

NIU is one of the first universities in the state to purchase computers with machine translation capabilities, Tourville said. The center’s four KayPro computers are capable of translating material from one language to another. Students then can edit and polish the rough translations, which teaches them language skills and makes them more marketable, Tourville said.

Many businesses require employees to have a working knowledge of sophisticated computers with machine translation capabilities, Skinner said.

The software sells for $11,000 per language direction (such as English to Spanish) or $5,500 for institutions such as NIU, Romel Regalado, coordinator of marketing and support services for Worldwide Communication Corp., said.

Tourville said about 70 students in advanced four-year programs will have access to the computer software.

NIU purchased Spanish, French and German software for the computers, Tourville said. Although NIU offers a four-year degree in Russian, software is not yet available in this language.

About five colleges and 109 businesses in the United States have purchased computer assisted translation software similar to NIU’s, Regaldo said.

Robert Hart, associate director of the language and learning laboratory at the University of Illinois-Champaign, said jobs in the field will require machine translation skills.

“The computer programs typically require a certain amount of pre-editing and vary in sophistication of translation required. We felt the technology was not quite advanced enough (to justify purchasing the software),” Hart said.

The center also offers audio-visual equipment for teachers to preview materials or to prepare synchronized slide/tape presentations.

Three carrels are equipped with video cassette recorders which are capable of playing international video tapes, Tourville said.

For multi-media presentations, the center offers a sound-proof room equipped with a slide projector, 16mm film projector, an overhead projector, a video cassette recorder with international and U.S. formats and a projector for slide presentations or video viewing, Tourville said.