<p>I'm thinking of taking either of these languages sometime at Cornell. How does the faculty/program itself compare between the two departments? And also, how easy is it to squeeze a language in an engineering schedule?</p>
<p>I am taking Russian and I love it! The professors are great and the classes are well organized. I know someone who was taking both Arabic and Russian and said that the Russian professors were significantly better. That being said, languages at Cornell are very hard and time consuming so it might be difficult to fit it into your schedule.</p>
<p>either of these languages will be very hard for an engineer to squeeze in…
Arabic at Cornell is very well regarded - my dd took it and has spent two years in the middle east at this point - her Arabic teachers in Jordan know the head of Arabic at Cornell…</p>
<p>I know several people who took Arabic at Cornell and they all enjoyed it. Realize you don’t really “squeeze” a language into your schedule. Especially an introductory language class and double especially a non-Western language, you will spend at least 1-2 hours EVERY night studying. I started German at Cornell which is significantly easier and my homework was at least 1 hour daily. That said, languages are fun classes and unlike your Engineering classes, will be an intellectual “break.”</p>
<p>I took Arabic and really enjoyed it. Makdah was my professor.</p>
<p>MikeyC - I just took a class at CAU with Prof Brann…loved it . gave him the update on all the Arabic students currently in the MiddleEast…as I was going thru the list one of my CAU classmates asked is this an update to a soap Opera? thought you would appreciate that!</p>