Navy overhauls foreign language bonus program

Parlez-vous Francais? A “yes” from a U.S. sailor could mean an extra $500 a month.

The Navy made changes to its Foreign Language Proficiency Bonus Program, tripling the payout for some languages, recategorizing others and opening the program to all sailors who use language skills in their work, not just those in fields such as cryptology or intelligence, said Mark Neighbors, director of the Navy Foreign Language Program Office.

That means, for example, sailors who test proficient in French on the Defense Language Proficiency Test could earn as much as $500 a month for using their language skills during the Navy’s new missions in western Africa, Neighbors said.

Sailors can take the roughly three- to five-hour exam at any Navy College Office. For now, overseas sailors can take the exam only on paper, while those in the States have the option of taking a Web-based version.

However, within weeks or months, depending on how trial phases go, sailors overseas also will have the Web-based option. Technicians were at the Navy College Office in Naples, Italy, last week, working to launch the first overseas Web-based testing site.

In June 2006, the Navy’s Foreign Language Program Office, following guidelines set out in the Defense Language Transformation Roadmap, sorted the world’s languages into a three-tier bonus system, based on criteria such as the importance of a specific language to the military’s mission and the number of speakers already in the force.

For example, Arabic and Farsi are classified as critical languages, and sailors testing well on the language proficiency test could earn upward of $500 a month per language just by knowing either — even if they’re not using the language skill for their work. However, once the Navy knows sailors can speak a language, they could be tasked with using it.

Conversely, the Navy has plenty of Spanish and French speakers, and the service simply couldn’t afford to pay them all bonuses for proficiency, Neighbors said. However, with French now reclassified as a critical skill — due to the start-up of Africa Command and the Navy’s missions with many of the former French colonies in the Gulf of Guinea — a sailor might qualify for the bonus.

In a 2006 Navy census, 77 percent of the active force and 89 percent of the Reserve claimed to be speak languages other than English, but not all have taken the proficiency test, Neighbors said. As of July 1, 300 languages are represented in the Navy’s database — including Navaho, Gaelic and Ecclesiastical Latin.

By building up the database, the Navy can also better pair up a sailor with a job if language is used, according to Master Chief Petty Officer Richard Robinson, the Navy Foreign Language Program manger.

The change also means enlisted sailors can qualify for a Navy Enlisted Classification code for foreign language skills, something to pad their resumes even if they don’t collect a bonus, he said.