The highest national research award for foreign language education recently was awarded to the team of Xiaowan Zhang, MSU Ph.D. alumna in Second Language Studies; Paula Winke, Professor in MSU’s Department of Linguistics, Languages, and Cultures; and Shaunna Clark, Associate Professor at Texas A&M University, for their research paper, “Background Characteristics and Oral Proficiency Development Over Time in Lower-Division College Foreign Language Programs.”  

The 2021 Paul Pimsleur Award, presented by the National Federation of Modern Language Teachers’ Association (NFMLTA) and The Modern Language Journal, recognizes this work as the most outstanding 2020 contribution to research in world language education.