>>2. I think it borders on, let's say "the wild edge of funny", to write such things if it is intended for a wide audience. Most American-born physicians, pharmacists, engineers, and researchers do not have time to learn six languages. Now if this is for students of linguistics only, or diplomats, then yes, this is acceptable.<<<
I'm actually more skeptical of the possibility of becoming a polyglot "in that sense" (refer to the study plan you can see; this isn't what I'll post there*) and in (just) 4 years. Putting almost everything aside, studying 9 hours would be, superficially, essentially conducive to a REALLY good knowledge of a couple of languages. (Chinese medical students spend far more time daily on studying alone)
By common sense, it is an idea to be spoken of. The plan could be possible, and if it did work, that would actually save much time of THE determined students.... who would otherwise have to spend multiple years studying a single language ineffectively. The idea of providing tailor-made learning materials is already VERY brilliant and is perfectly possible - that's at least what I think to be immediately possible with money.
*I'm also a poster there. I must say, well, online communities seem to develop in similar patterns everywhere, regardless of cultural differences. The Chinese mindset has been often cautious with political correctness - so I don't write in exactly the same way in antimoon (tend to more somewhat more open), but I think you should be able to guess who I am by referring to my written Chinese accent.
==
INSTITUTE
To start with... if there were an institute of such, I'd seriously consider enrolling in it if I were not already studying elsewhere. An ordinary "world-class" Chinese university, well, everything is quite good - you can see people from the States and everywhere studying quite well and having fun here - but certainly you won't learn everything and enough. Students here, like others, want to spend credits as quickly as possible, and there are always notorious professors who would make your GPA suck. Certain programs might be less intensive (certainly so, compared to the proposed plan), but then chances are they are watered down so much that people could learn little. In relation to learning languages, there ARE a couple of them in some such universities, but there is no such thing as a course for Indonesian / Russian / every other Chinese language (which would all be available in many US universities). So, as I see it, I think the plan is brilliant in the sense that "I can't conceivably imagine such an academy in my country". If you speak newspeak only, you won't know what "bad" is (ungood), what "excellent" is (plus good? forgot) - and there's no such word as polyglottery in Chinese, where the best equivalent is a long phrase few people "know" (精通多國語言 is often a rare linguistic trait of either foreigners, the "ghosts", or Chinese who must have been abroad for 10+ years).
INPUT
I'm thinking of S. Krashen. Language courses, at least the one I take (for GPA), isn't exactly conducive to LOW ANXIETY. I often get almost full marks (so it works for me), but then there are often exams, tests, and people often speak with a terrible accent (or can they speak at all? I doubt it). "Softly" forcing people to produce output (i.e. speak with loads of pauses and write compositions, both with countless mistakes) could be as bad as forcing them "hard". An ordinary language course would not be conducive to learning using comprehensible input. The language teacher, in the hope of both satisfying their own desire of teaching and earning money (or feeding their family), is implying through tuition that you CANNOT learn a language alone, you HAD better follow their way, learn that language for multiple years; after you are done with undergraduate studies, you would be left with a foreign language in which you can't really express comfortably, which you can't even "show off" during any sort of interviews or small talks with native speakers (if you dare to, with all your self-embarrassing, poor linguistic skills).
Idea
From NONE (no idea) to SOME (some ideas, some planning, and something that could be possible, at least in the US through the effort of the American professor, with money), that is MUCH. When I discovered 4 years ago that, in the newly discovered Learning Languages forum, there were lots of "Western" polyglots (for all their presumed good economic as well as linguistic background, which was a big plus for both developing career everywhere and for a cultured person), I was speechless; when I realized there was a professor of distinguished (linguistic) ability and, recently, there were even polyglot education ideas, I WAS speechless.
I still understand that I can't speak authentic English "properly" without staying in an Anglophone country for some time; but compared to poor monolinguals of my people who rarely know ANYTHING, if at all, about foreign cultures, just because there is so much politics in foreign language education, I've personally had experienced a mental revolution. That is truly an epiphany for a poor monolingual. (A scholar of the linguistics department is still claiming that you, the Anglophone, can only learn something as Chinese well enough through marrying a native speaker!)
==
There must be some limitations, such as language "prerequisites", but the plan you can see makes much sense - I don't think such an academy in Hong Kong or the US wouldn't establish English (and even French and German) as quasi-official.
In real terms, cultural differences aside, cultural information you CAN read (i.e. books, essays...every publication/text you can find in a decent university) are often in English and English only. Much of my own doubts, like the essentially different study plans of individual students (e.g. I can read annotated texts to read classical Chinese; many of you can't), have already been addressed by the professor (and some others).
The language choice is fine. It's always pleasing to see the Americans (and their European brothers) are always coming up with loads of language courses, in class or as a textbook, or, at least, nice ideas about learning. I'm not very into East Asian languages, but I'm always glad to see many people (our American and European brothers) becoming very interested in them. The global language market, as I see it, has to be led by English (the language; and America the country). When people become more confident with their English, they would be learning more languages.
Again, some of the doubts, like whether Spanish and Irish are suitable, have been addressed somewhat. As for the idea of learning multiple languages in the course of a few years, the schedule might be a bit rigid, but that's how it could be designed. Not studying loads of "useless", GPA-unpromising subjects and forcing yourself to study 9 hours are enough for acquiring multiple languages in this fashion. (But then, could the environment keep your anxiety low?)
I'm actually more skeptical of the possibility of becoming a polyglot "in that sense" (refer to the study plan you can see; this isn't what I'll post there*) and in (just) 4 years. Putting almost everything aside, studying 9 hours would be, superficially, essentially conducive to a REALLY good knowledge of a couple of languages. (Chinese medical students spend far more time daily on studying alone)
By common sense, it is an idea to be spoken of. The plan could be possible, and if it did work, that would actually save much time of THE determined students.... who would otherwise have to spend multiple years studying a single language ineffectively. The idea of providing tailor-made learning materials is already VERY brilliant and is perfectly possible - that's at least what I think to be immediately possible with money.
*I'm also a poster there. I must say, well, online communities seem to develop in similar patterns everywhere, regardless of cultural differences. The Chinese mindset has been often cautious with political correctness - so I don't write in exactly the same way in antimoon (tend to more somewhat more open), but I think you should be able to guess who I am by referring to my written Chinese accent.
==
INSTITUTE
To start with... if there were an institute of such, I'd seriously consider enrolling in it if I were not already studying elsewhere. An ordinary "world-class" Chinese university, well, everything is quite good - you can see people from the States and everywhere studying quite well and having fun here - but certainly you won't learn everything and enough. Students here, like others, want to spend credits as quickly as possible, and there are always notorious professors who would make your GPA suck. Certain programs might be less intensive (certainly so, compared to the proposed plan), but then chances are they are watered down so much that people could learn little. In relation to learning languages, there ARE a couple of them in some such universities, but there is no such thing as a course for Indonesian / Russian / every other Chinese language (which would all be available in many US universities). So, as I see it, I think the plan is brilliant in the sense that "I can't conceivably imagine such an academy in my country". If you speak newspeak only, you won't know what "bad" is (ungood), what "excellent" is (plus good? forgot) - and there's no such word as polyglottery in Chinese, where the best equivalent is a long phrase few people "know" (精通多國語言 is often a rare linguistic trait of either foreigners, the "ghosts", or Chinese who must have been abroad for 10+ years).
INPUT
I'm thinking of S. Krashen. Language courses, at least the one I take (for GPA), isn't exactly conducive to LOW ANXIETY. I often get almost full marks (so it works for me), but then there are often exams, tests, and people often speak with a terrible accent (or can they speak at all? I doubt it). "Softly" forcing people to produce output (i.e. speak with loads of pauses and write compositions, both with countless mistakes) could be as bad as forcing them "hard". An ordinary language course would not be conducive to learning using comprehensible input. The language teacher, in the hope of both satisfying their own desire of teaching and earning money (or feeding their family), is implying through tuition that you CANNOT learn a language alone, you HAD better follow their way, learn that language for multiple years; after you are done with undergraduate studies, you would be left with a foreign language in which you can't really express comfortably, which you can't even "show off" during any sort of interviews or small talks with native speakers (if you dare to, with all your self-embarrassing, poor linguistic skills).
Idea
From NONE (no idea) to SOME (some ideas, some planning, and something that could be possible, at least in the US through the effort of the American professor, with money), that is MUCH. When I discovered 4 years ago that, in the newly discovered Learning Languages forum, there were lots of "Western" polyglots (for all their presumed good economic as well as linguistic background, which was a big plus for both developing career everywhere and for a cultured person), I was speechless; when I realized there was a professor of distinguished (linguistic) ability and, recently, there were even polyglot education ideas, I WAS speechless.
I still understand that I can't speak authentic English "properly" without staying in an Anglophone country for some time; but compared to poor monolinguals of my people who rarely know ANYTHING, if at all, about foreign cultures, just because there is so much politics in foreign language education, I've personally had experienced a mental revolution. That is truly an epiphany for a poor monolingual. (A scholar of the linguistics department is still claiming that you, the Anglophone, can only learn something as Chinese well enough through marrying a native speaker!)
==
There must be some limitations, such as language "prerequisites", but the plan you can see makes much sense - I don't think such an academy in Hong Kong or the US wouldn't establish English (and even French and German) as quasi-official.
In real terms, cultural differences aside, cultural information you CAN read (i.e. books, essays...every publication/text you can find in a decent university) are often in English and English only. Much of my own doubts, like the essentially different study plans of individual students (e.g. I can read annotated texts to read classical Chinese; many of you can't), have already been addressed by the professor (and some others).
The language choice is fine. It's always pleasing to see the Americans (and their European brothers) are always coming up with loads of language courses, in class or as a textbook, or, at least, nice ideas about learning. I'm not very into East Asian languages, but I'm always glad to see many people (our American and European brothers) becoming very interested in them. The global language market, as I see it, has to be led by English (the language; and America the country). When people become more confident with their English, they would be learning more languages.
Again, some of the doubts, like whether Spanish and Irish are suitable, have been addressed somewhat. As for the idea of learning multiple languages in the course of a few years, the schedule might be a bit rigid, but that's how it could be designed. Not studying loads of "useless", GPA-unpromising subjects and forcing yourself to study 9 hours are enough for acquiring multiple languages in this fashion. (But then, could the environment keep your anxiety low?)