Students eligible for a federal grant might want to think twice about how “smart” their concentration is. A Science and Mathematics Access to Retain Talent (SMART) Grant, part of a bill awaiting a final Congressional vote, would give an additional $4,000 per year to juniors and seniors eligible for the Pell Grant—provided they are majoring in “science, math, technology, engineering, or a foreign language determined to be critical to the national security of the United States,” according to the legislation.

The proposal, spearheaded by Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R.–Tenn., defines a critical language as “a foreign language that the Secretary, in consultation with the Director of National Intelligence, determines is critical to the national security of the United States.”

It is not clear how the critical languages will be selected. Some languages have already received governmental attention through the National Security Agency and the National Security Education Program’s (NSEP) Boren Undergraduate Scholarships.

Harvard’s director of federal relations, Suzanne Day, wrote in an e-mail that the NSEP scholarship preferences comprise “the likeliest model [the Secretary] may follow,”

Of the foreign languages offering degrees at the College, some Romance and Near Eastern languages and all Germanic languages are not covered by the NSEP program.

Students studying Romance languages said they were surprised to see French and Spanish missing from the list, which includes Portuguese and Romanian.

“I don’t know whether [the reason for] the lack of funding for Spanish is that it’s not considered critical, or a lot of students are already studying Spanish, so additional funding is not needed as an incentive,” said Veronica T. Golin ’07.

Stephen M. Amrock ’08 said that most college students do not come in contact with some of the critical languages as part of their high school experiences, making them less likely to pursue the languages in college.

“Supply isn’t meeting the demand. They need to be giving some sort of incentive in order to cover all their bases,” he said.

Lea H. Broh ’08 said she supported any reason to learn languages.

“Any initiative that gets people studying foreign languages is a good thing,” she said.

Broh studies Spanish, which does not appear on NSEP’s list, but she also studies Portuguese, which does.

“I’m not sure I like being under the auspices of national security as opposed to international understanding,” she said.

Day reiterated Harvard’s focus on generalized support for its students requiring financial aid.

“While it is always encouraging to see a renewed interest in increasing federal grant aid for needy students, our focus remains on growing the federal Pell grant program with its core philosophy of supporting the access and opportunity of all students with need,” she wrote.

The SMART grant represents “a new direction in federal policymaking,” Day said over the phone, because it does not guarantee funding to all needy students.

“You always worry when dollars are limited,” she said.

But Professor of Romance Languages and Literatures Virginie Greene said that she worries the program will restrain educational priorities, too.

“By linking so closely higher education to national security and to ‘high-paying, high-skill jobs that drive the 21st century economy’ (Frist quoted in the Chatanooga.com, 18 Dec. 2005), Senator Frist limits considerably the scope and purpose of higher education,” Greene wrote in an e-mail.

Nevertheless, Greene said she does not foresee a threat to the academic security of particular Romance languages.

“I don’t believe that it will suddenly boost the study of Portuguese and Romanian (which would be a good thing in itself) at the detriment of Spanish, French, Italian and less studied romance languages such as Catalan,” she wrote. “The motivations for studying these languages will remain diverse and strong, with or without financial incentive.”

According to students, though, an extra $4,000 wouldn’t hurt.

“If I were eligible for a Pell Grant, and there was more aid available, I would consider studying Portuguese or Romanian over the languages that I’m studying now,” said Christopher A. Dotson ’08, who is taking Italian and Spanish.

Chair of the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations (NELC) P. Oktor Skjaervo said he is less optimistic about the choice of critical languages on NSEP’s list, since it only includes living, spoken languages taught by NELC faculty.

“The eligibility requirements seem discriminatory and may affect adversely the NELC concentration,” Skjaervo wrote in an e-mail.

Citing Harvard’s generous aid packages for its students, Day said that she does not think there will be a momentous impact.

“The financial aid the College offers to students with need is quite comprehensive and, given this new federal program is limited to Pell-eligible students, the beneficiaries are likely to be already receiving strong grant aid from the College,” Day wrote.

According to some, exclusion from the list is an auspicious political sign. Greene said that, as a French citizen, she is comforted that French does not feature on NSEP’s list.

“This means that France and francophone countries are not presently considered as places where the U.S. may intervene...which, given the current situation in Iraq, is not something I would wish for my country,” she wrote.

After the Senate passed the bill last month, the House is scheduled to vote on it on Feb. 1.

—Staff writer Lulu Zhou can be reached at luluzhou@fas.harvard.edu.