ALYKI, GREECE - Think of the typical American college experience. Large, old buildings. A green campus.

Meals served in a dining hall. And football and basketball games to go to each Saturday. Now, imagine a dream vacation. Beaches. Beautiful hotels. Restaurants on the water. And boats coming in and out of the bay. The two settings dont seem to mesh, except on the tiny Greek island of Paros, in the even tinier village of Alyki. That is where students live for a few weeks each summer as part of College Year in Athens summer courses to learn Greek. Learning Greek in Greece is extremely benecial considering that youre constantly surrounded by the culture and the language, Ariana Arbes, a senior at St. Josephs University in Philadelphia, said. It allows for an opportunity that you cant get elsewhere. College Year in Athens started in 1962 with ve students and now serves roughly 140 students each semester. The summer program though, is structured differently. Students spent one week in Athens before moving to Paros and living at the beautiful Narges Hotel for two weeks. There, they were divided into groups based on their level of prociency in Greek. Ryan Collins is a graduate student at Hellenic College in Boston and was impressed with the CYAs teaching methods. Ive taken a number of different programs in Greek, and the way that they present the material, the books they use and the professors that they have are very good, he said. The program works because its faculty truly believes that Greek cannot be taught properly anywhere but Greece. You cannot teach the language without showing the Greek character, the Greek civilization, because all the words have the root in Greek civilization, Marinetta Papahimona, who has been with CYA since 1979, said. It reminds you a little big of My Big Fat Greek Wedding, but I cannot avoid it because this is the truth. And the professors make sure the students get plenty of Greek character. On the night we visited, the President of CYA Alexis Phylactopoulos had the entire summer class over to his home for dinner. Aside from offering a stunning view of , Phylactopoulos offered Greek food and a family atmosphere. When asked what the best the part about the course was, Arbes said it was the loxenia, which literally translates to love of strangers. To Papahimona, seeing that the students are comfortable with each other and get plenty of Greek culture helps the students speak the language.

We (Greeks) are not afraid to show our character. We have reaction. We see something beautiful we are going to say it. This is beautiful. We see something bad we are going to express that this is bad. This is a little bit strange for American students. I think lately it has become worse. They dont express their feelings, they like to be only listeners and they dont have reactions. And after watching Papahimonas colorful interactions with the students, it is easy to see she practices what she preaches. You cannot speak the Greek language if you dont have the body, the expressions of the face, the expression of the eyes and everything, she said.