AMHERST — After a classmate in the Four-Skilled Arabic Language program recently went to the emergency room, University of Massachusetts junior Luc-Andre Sader was among those checking on the student’s well-being and offering support.
This demonstration of care and compassion, like he would have for the other 21 students in the class, shows how the program has become a home for Sader, who identifies as Lebanese American, and is hoping to become fluent in the language of his father.
“I’ve never experienced a home and community of classmates that facilitates that kind of community,” said Sader, who is majoring in Middle Eastern studies and has studied abroad in Jordan. “This is a home for me.”
For Beatrix Worthington, a sophomore, Four-Skilled Arabic is a joyful class, where students are offered individualized attention in reading, writing, speaking and listening, and is everything an intensive language course should be.
“Enrollment is steadily increasing, which speaks to an academic program that students are seeking out and finding,” Worthington said.
Yet despite what the students view as a successful program, affiliated with the Department of Languages, Literatures and Cultures and run through the Five College Consortium, this Arabic language track is in the final weeks of being offered at UMass.
With time running out, after an October 2025 announcement that the Four-Skilled Arabic program would end after the fall 2026 semester, supporters came to the Oct. 15 Faculty Senate meeting, many wearing shirts reading “Keep Four-Skilled Arabic,” and making their appeals that the program continue and that Nahla Khalil, a senior lecturer of Arabic, remain in the position.
They are asking both administrators and professors to intervene. They are also disseminating a “call to action” effort targeting the administration to reverse course.
This is the latest effort after circulating a petition in the spring that had more than 1,000 signatures, but yielded no change, with all indications that to continue this Arabic language track they will have to venture off campus.
Despite reaching out to senior leaders dozens of times, there has been little to no response, supporters who want to keep the program said.
“It’s especially frustrating when these people have emails in their inboxes and haven’t responded,” Sader said.
Following the Faculty Senate meeting, though, students learned they will be able to speak to Maria del Guadalupe Davidson, dean of the college of humanities and fine arts, but that meeting is scheduled after Nov. 9, the date when the course catalog for spring 2027 opens and students begin registering for classes.
After numerous comments and questions at the Faculty Senate, Farshid Hajir, senior vice provost and dean of undergraduate education, said that the decision to terminate the program was made by the Five College provosts, not by UMass.
While he and others appreciate students’ advocacy, Hajir said UMass has to make many difficult decisions around funding and what stand-alone programs to retain.
Hajir said that Arabic language continues to be offered at the elementary, intermediate and advanced levels through the Judaic Near Eastern Studies department, and that this class, with 19 students enrolled, should not be seen as lesser than Four-Skilled Arabic.
For those who want to continue Four-Skilled Arabic, that remains accessible through a course on the Smith College campus in Northampton. “That is a possible path,” Hajir said.
Advocates for the program point to financial statistics showing that in fiscal 2025, UMass paid $130,588 into the Five Colleges language initiative, out of $429,584 in assessments. They argue that the university could use its assessment for its own program.
Kathryn Lachman, a professor in the College of Humanities and Fine Arts and director of the program in comparative literature, said she appreciates budget constraints, but wondered how Four-Skilled Arabic’s termination is in the best interest of students and their potential for success.
Rachel Green, assistant professor and undergraduate program director of comparative literature, said without the Four-Skilled Arabic, UMass will be an outlier among peer institutions.
When asked why the Faculty Senate didn’t get to have input on the matter, as it does with other course offerings, Anthony Paik, a sociology professor who acts as the secretary of the Faculty Senate, said it has no “per se jurisdiction” over what has been a Five Colleges program.
Retaining Four-Skilled Arabic also has support from the Student Government Association. President Michael Borowski said the student representatives support its continuation, citing Smith College as showing forward thinking in finding a way to continue offering the program.
Also endorsing keeping Four-Skilled Arabic was Ashley Chamu Charco, who serves as the student trustee to the UMass Board of Trustees.
The petition was supplemented with testimonials from students who mentioned the class restoring their love for learning and the Arabic language.
Being more intensive and more focused “gets you to a higher level of fluency faster,” Sader said.
Worthington said students are not dismissing the other Arabic language program, only to speak to the excellence of Four-Skilled Arabic, and that budget issues shouldn’t be driving the decision when UMass has had budget surpluses and spends significant sums on athletics.
“This is a UMass program, she was hired by UMass and the department is a department at UMass,” Worthington said. “What we’re saying is why can’t UMass do the same?”
“It seems ridiculous and frustrating to me that there’s no money to fund this program,” Worthington said “What is a better use for their money than this program, with high enrollment and great language retention? A flagship university should be doing everything to protect a program.”
The students contend a new teaching assistant is also being hired for the Arabic language program to assist the remaining professor.
Sader said students are ready to work with anyone to make the offering of Arabic language as broad as possible, rather than limiting options.
“Our focus is we have to have all of these options available,” Sader said.
