Lucas--please read

Lucas--I only have your blog site and posted this comment on there as well; hope you read this.
Trey got this foreign service email today and thought you and Star would be interested--Re: Arabic & Russian:


Hello:
You have subscribed to the U.S. Department of State careers website listserve. We would like to bring to your attention changes regarding the Bonus Points for Foreign Languages, including Critical Needs Languages (CNL).

Previously, successful specialist candidates could earn only two points (2) on a 100 point scale for demonstrated competency in any foreign language. Effective July 1, 2006, they are eligible on a 100 point scale for a bonus equivalent to that which generalist candidates receive: either 5.7 points for a CNL or 2.4 points for a non-CNL. Bonus points improve a candidate's standing on the rank order register.

NOTE: Critical Needs Languages are currently defined as: Arabic; Chinese (Cantonese and Standard/Mandarin); Indic languages (e.g.,Urdu, Hindi, Nepali, Bengali, Punjabi); Iranian languages (e.g. Farsi/Persian, Dari, Tajiki, Pashto); Korean; Russian; and Turkic Languages (e.g. Azerbaijani, Kazakh, Kyrgyz, Turkish, Turkmen, Uzbek).