How to obtain recent Foreign Service Institute learning materials?

March 31, 2012 10:45 PM

How do I obtain newer Foreign Service Institute language learning coursework and education materials?

I have seen some materials produced by the Foreign Service Institute to teach different languages. Most of the materials that I have seen are from quite long ago and may be a little bit outdated. How can I obtain newer versions of FSI produced coursework? Would I have to file a Freedom of Information Act? Would they reject it based on anything? Has anyone tried to access these types of materials and been rejected?

posted by andendau to Education (3 answers total)

You mean this?
posted by mochapickle at 10:48 PM on March 31, 2012 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: That is a good resource but for example the public domain version of, say, Korean is from 1968. I would like something more recent and in the public domain.
posted by andendau at 10:56 PM on March 31, 2012

I don't guarantee newer material that is specifically for the FSI, but you can find a lot of public domain language learning material on the ERIC database run by the Department of Education. I posted it here on Metafilter a while ago and people found some neat links in it.

Depending on what language you are searching for, you will find themed topics (health) or different levels (beginner, or Portuguese for Spanish speakers, etc) and varying ages of documents (Arabic and Haitian Creole often being newer than Russian, for example).

Enjoy!
posted by whatzit at 3:14 AM on April 2, 2012