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@Linguist_CIOL OCTOBER/NOVEMBER The Linguist 21 FEATURES SSEES's work, reflecting a global trend towards interdisciplinary approaches and a need to meet that demand from prospective students. "I cannot imagine offering Slavonic and East European Studies without culture," says Koenker. "As practitioners of language- based area studies, we are committed to the belief that understanding a society, economy or history requires an in-depth knowledge of cultural traditions and cultural diversity." Today, degrees in language and culture account for just 13% of intake. SSEES's largest undergraduate degree is its interdisciplinary BA in History, Politics and Economics (HPE), taken by 40% of students, with a large number studying Economics and Business with East European Studies (25%) and Politics and Sociology (21%). The school is now developing a parallel multidisciplinary degree that will be more language-focused: Culture, History and Society. "In our current thinking, language training and a third Year Abroad will be mandatory for this programme, and we intend that its graduates will have developed genuine competency in the language of their choice," Koenker says. The impact of Brexit The UK's impending exit from the EU is a major concern. At the moment, students from other EU countries can enrol at UCL on the same terms as UK domestic students, so there has been no drop in numbers, but after Brexit they will be classified as 'overseas students' and will need to pay a higher tariff. EU students account for 25% of SSEES's student cohort, so this could have a dramatic impact on applications to degree courses. This is particularly concerning given that the percentage of UK students at SSEES has decreased steadily in recent years to about a third, and just over half of students on language and culture programmes. In 2018-2019, the largest share of students came from overseas, including North America, Russia and, increasingly, China. Another difficulty is the end of access to Erasmus. "We are working with our exchange partners across Europe to make sure our Year Abroad arrangements remain active, because we want to be just as engaged in the world beyond Britain as we always have been," Koenker explains. SSEES is also facing a loss of research funding due to Brexit. "Our academics are currently engaged in many important research projects in collaboration with our European partners," she adds. This includes two major multidisciplinary research projects exploring the local causes of 'fatigue with the democratic transition' and 'populist rebellion'. Led by SSEES, these are being conducted with universities in Czechia (formerly the Czech Republic), Estonia, Hungary, Poland and Serbia. The school is developing a philanthropic fundraising strategy that would provide more support for students, including research travel grants and bursaries to offset fees. It has close relations with the embassies of the region, and they work together to organise conferences and events. Technological advances Another development has been the integration of new technologies – a must for any modern education institution. UCL makes extensive use of Moodle for communicating with students, while coursework is submitted through Turnitin, which provides flexible tools for online marking. Many lectures are recorded and played back through Lecturecast. The use of the multimedia sharing platform VoiceThread in some language classes "gives students much more opportunity for speaking and listening practice without taking away from the other skills taught in the classroom setting. Moreover, it provides for prompt and helpful feedback," says Koenker. Attracting students to study the languages of the smaller countries of the region has always been a challenge, and many universities have been cutting back or eliminating programmes such as Polish and Czech. In the past, the UK government made language support a priority by funding new staff positions, and the governments of Slovenia, Croatia and Bulgaria continue to fund tutors in their respective languages. For the last decade, SSEES has offered taster languages courses during the summer and on UCL Open Days. 1 "We know that government agencies are extremely eager to recruit graduates with language skills, and many of our graduates go on to work in the government, defence or security departments," Koenker concludes, with about 90% going on to employment or further study. An institution such as SSEES will always be in the process of developing. Koenker's focus is on using resources to recruit staff and students, optimise their contributions to teaching and research, and engage with the wider public. For further information see www.ucl.ac.uk/ssees or Twitter @UCLSSEES. Notes 1 www.youtube.com/user/UCLSSEES LIFE-LONG LEARNING (Top to bottom) The school entrance; an SSEES event; and Director Diane Koenker