Polish Language Program at Cornell

Introduction

• Polish fulfills the language requirement and the distribution requirement at Cornell.

• We offer three levels of the language: elementary, intermediate, and advanced.

• Elementary Polish is on MWF.

• You can find the Society of Polish Students at Cornell on Facebook. 

• Polish is a Slavic language hosted by the Romance Studies Department.

• Did you know that it is the second most widely spoken Slavic language in the world? It uses Latin script like English, which makes studying it easier.  

Placement and Transfer of Credit

Determining Level of Achievement

• If you are a heritage speaker of Polish, which means that you speak or spoke Polish at home but did not go to any Polish school in the USA, please contact the instructor, Ewa Bachminska. Such students most often enroll in Elementary Polish I.
• If you are a heritage speaker and you went to a Polish school in the USA, please contact the Polish instructor to determine your language skills.
• If you are a native speaker who wants accreditation for his/her language abilities, please contact the Polish instructor.

Contacts for Language Placement

If you have any questions regarding the language placements tests, please contact:

• Ewa Bachminska, Senior Lecturer of Polish Language, Klarman K135
• Cal Hile, Undergraduate Coordinator, Klarman K165; 5-8222

For information about transfer of credit, please consult our placement page.

Course Descriptions

Please refer to the Polish section of the Romance Studies Course Offerings list. See our departmental course roster here.

Study Abroad

Cornell offers Summer and Winter Abroad funding to study in Poland.

• Michael J. Harum Memorial Prize

• Frederic Conger Wood Research Fellowship

For more information, please contact Dr. Jason Hecht from the Cornell Institute of European Studies or the Polish instructor, Ewa Bachminska.

Students of Polish, who received grants for a summer or winter abroad in Poland, took the following pictures:

Demonstration in Poland with Basia Sudol


Warsaw by Night by Emma Stillings


Polish Cat by Lydia Holley

Polish Tatry, by Alexander Mocarski