The 29th annual Foreign Language Field Day is scheduled for Tuesday.

The theme for this year is “Celebrating the World’s Diversity.”

Foreign Language Field Day brings nearly 40 different junior high and high schools from around the area to Missouri Southern in order to test their understanding of foreign languages. The languages tested are French, German and Spanish.

Dr. Tatiana Karmanova, director of the International Language Resource Center and associate professor of communications, is responsible for planning the event.

“I have to make schedules, assign faculty, notify schools and anything else that needs to be done,” Karmanova said.

“It’s a lot of fun for the students because they get a reward in the noncompetitive events.

“We have fake Euro bills that the students earn, which they can exchange for various prizes.”

The students have the opportunity to earn various prizes, including colored pencils, hackey sacks and sombreros.

Ruschelle Jones, junior Spanish and international studies major, is also involved in the event.

“A lot of Southern students help out,” Jones said. “Everyone that has a foreign language performance award is required to help because it’s grown too much.”

In the past five years, the event has doubled in size.

“We used to have around 500 students attend, but it’s grown to a little over 1,000,” Karmanova said.

All high school and junior high students that attend will receive a “passport” that contains the day’s program and schedule.

In addition to the students and 11 faculty members that help run the field day, there are numerous volunteers.

“The volunteers are usually natives that speak Belgian or French,” Karmanova said. “One volunteer is actually a graduate from Missouri Southern and is a native from Austria.”

Next year marks the 30th anniversary of Foreign Language Field Day.

“I’m still trying to plan this year’s, but I’ll have to start planning for next year’s soon,” Karmanova said.