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Top Ten Reasons to Study German

Why Learn German?


Giants of German Classical literature: Goethe and Schiller

  1. Germany is the world’s largest exporter.

  2. The EU language with the largest number of native speakers is German.

  3. 18% of the world’s books are published in German.

  4. Germany is home to numerous international corporations.

  5. German is no harder to learn to speak and write than other languages.

  6. German is the second-most commonly used scientific language.

  7. German is the language of Goethe, Nietzsche and Kafka. Mozart, Bach, Beethoven, Freud and Einstein also spoke German.

  8. Speaking and understanding German will deepen your knowledge of the culture and improve your employment opportunities.

  9. Learning German provides deeper insights into a region that plays a vital role in central Europe’s intellectual and economic life and in its cultural history.

  10. In many regions, Germans account for the largest percentage of tourists.

--List courtesy of the American Association of German Teachers


 

The Alma College Students in Free Enterprise (SIFE) team claimed its ninth consecutive regional championship at the SIFE USA Regional Competition in March 2009. The competition awards the SIFE teams that are most effective in teaching the principals of market economics through outreach projects in their communities.

 

Graduate Profile

Elizabeth Priester Steding

Elizabeth Priester Steding
Graduation: 1994
Major: German

Elizabeth Priester Steding came to Alma College thinking she would become an elementary school teacher. Placing into third-year German changed her mind.

Now an assistant professor of German at Luther College in Decorah, Iowa, she completed her master’s degree in German while teaching high school, through a summer program at University of California, Santa Barbara.