The future of the Chinese language program at Mid-Prairie Elementary Schools is in question as its instructor is retiring this spring.

Instructor Jean Hussey has worked for Mid-Prairie for 19 years, nine of them as a preschool associate and 10 years teaching Chinese for the kindergarten-fourth grades. Coming from a large family, Hussey says she enjoyed teaching the children, especially as she says it is easier for children to pick up a new language than adults.

Superintendent Mark Schneider comments on the Chinese program’s future, “One of the difficulties are that Chinese teachers are not easy to find. So right now we’re kind of in a period of evaluation and we’ll see what’s available, what the district wants us to do. But we believe strongly in having foreign language in our elementary schools and so I expect that we’ll be continuing to teach foreign language [to] kindergarten-twelfth grade.”

The program began in 2008 with federal grant funding for six years, and has since then been funded by the district’s general fund.