Learning a language is about more than just words

On a hot summer evening in front of Cadboro Commons, the smell of barbecued meat is still hanging in the air as Kumbia, a local salsa band, hits the first notes of a signature Santana tune, Oye Como Va. The audience is a group of close to 150 international students from more than a dozen countries who are attending UVic's summer English Language and Culture program.

A lot of students stay sitting around the concrete tables and benches talking and eating. It's mostly the Latinos and Latinas in the crowd who jump up to dance. The beat is infectious and before long, a few of the program's cultural assistants, or CAs as they're called, start dancing and coax others to leave their pop and burgers to the wasps and join in. They're the social lubricant at the party. By the second or third song, a loose circle of jostling hips and shoulders has developed and shy faces become animated ones, as the reluctant among them are pulled in to dance.

In its 45th year, UVic's English Language Centre (ELC) is one of the largest in a Canadian university and has the most extensive homestay program in the country. This summer, there are more than 700 students on campus. Over the last year, 3,528 students have registered-the largest number in a single year. And the numbers are growing. To meet the demand, construction is beginning at the end of month on a 16-room extension to the Continuing Studies Building where the ELC is housed. It's set to open by the end of 2015.

During the summer, a variety of programs run concurrently: from academic intensives, to first year bridging programs, to the three or six-week language programs that balance classroom learning with social and cultural activities like hiking, kayaking, volunteering and, on this night in July, dancing.

Pedro Corbeiro, Gabriel Jim&e#180;nez and Philippe Gauvin-Levesque-from Brazil, M&e#180;xico and Qu&e#180;bec respectively-are sitting around their table talking about why dancing and socializing are the real heart of a language immersion program. "The classroom is about rules and grammar," says Philippe who came to UVic this summer on the recommendation of one of his old high school English teachers who got his education degree here. "You learn to speak by doing things."

Pedro nods vigorously. "One of the most important things we are learning is how to talk to other people and other cultures," says the young engineering student. "You have to learn to be comfortable communicating without perfect English, to communicate with movement."

"We've become masters of mime," says Philippe, and they all laugh-after he acts out what he means.

In the last weeks of the Pathways program, 18-year-old Ziyi Qi is one of a cohort of 120 mostly Chinese students studying first year economics, engineering or science concurrent with intensive English for twelve months. Since she was a little girl growing up in Changsha in south-central China, Ziyi had a curiosity about mermaids and the sea. Since she's been at UVic, she's decided that, now that she's completed her English as a second language requirement, she plans to switch from economics to study marine biology.

Some of her friends, she says, don't like to put themselves out there as much as she does, but she's thrown herself at as many opportunities as she can handle with her academic workload. She's gone for meals at First Peoples House, joined a drama group and started volunteering at the campus radio station CFUV. There, she's painted signs for concerts, tried reading the weather on air (but nobody could understand her, she laughed) and sometimes, she co-DJs a multicultural music show.

Huda Kutrani from Libya and Lamis Almadani from Saudi Arabia are registered in the summer session of the English Language Academic Intensive. Students from more than 15 nations attend 22.5 hours of classroom sessions per week, a slightly lighter load than the 30 hours per week in the three other semesters. Classes are held from upper beginner to university entrance level. Lamis and Huda, both here on full scholarships from their respective countries, became friends shortly after they came here this past winter and both plan to continue in the academic program at UVic for 12 to 18 months.

Lamis, who wears purple-rimmed glasses and a silky green hijab, has a degree in fashion design from the College of Art and Design at King Abdul Aziz University in Jedda. She's studying English so she can do a masters degree in business or education. Her class was recently assigned The Great Gatsby to read. When she sat down under a tree in the quad to start reading, she said: "Anything you read as part of the program gives you insight into the English-speaking world. I like that."

Huda is an associate lecturer at the University of Benghazi (formerly the Libyan University before the civil war) in the Faculty of Public Health. She has a Master's Degree in Health Information Science from Coventry University in the UK. Although she says her reading and writing skills in English are "okay," she wants to bring them to a much higher level in preparation for doing a PhD, which she hopes to do at UVic. There are always new discoveries being made in public health, she said, and she wants to be able to read about and participate in new research being done internationally.

Though the 104 academically focused students currently on campus have their heads in their books more than they'd sometimes like to in the summer, Huda and Lamis say that the ELC has been great in organizing outdoor activities to encourage them to explore the city and let the natural world do its thing to bring people together.

When asked what was one of their favourite memories so far, both of them said it was the trip to Witty's Lagoon, near Metchosin, with their classmates and teachers.

Huda brought her four-year-old son with her. It was the first time they had been to the ocean together, she said, and "it was beautiful." Lamis cut her foot. She could hardly walk afterwards, she said, but still, it was one of the best days she can remember, walking barefoot in the sand with her friends.