Thanks to John De Matteo
=====================================
For those interested in promoting the Italian language I offer the following
encouraging statistics taken from 

"Foreign Language Enrollments in the United States  
Institutions of Higher Education," 

Fall 1998 by Richard Brod and Elizabeth B. Wells.

Language     1995           1998     %Change

Spanish       606,286      656,590        8.3
French        205,351      199,064       -3.1
German        96,263        89,020        -7.5
ITALIAN     43,723        49,287       12.6

Report available www.adfl.org/resources/enroll.htm