The Center for East Asian and Pacific Studies (CEAPS) is the steward of campus-wide teaching, research, programming, and outreach on East Asia, as well as Southeast Asia and the Pacific. CEAPS serves almost 100 affiliate specialists on East Asia, as well as over 30 off campus affiliates across the state. CEAPS strives to broadly support the research, teaching, and service missions of the University of Illinois.
CEAPS was established in 1964 as the Center for Asian Studies. In 1984 the center was renamed, and in 1990 the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures was established in the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences to house faculty and course offerings in the language and humanistic study of East Asia.
In accordance with Title VI of the Higher Education Act of 1965 (HEA), the International and Foreign Language Education (IFLE) office of the United States Department of Education administers Title VI financial grant and fellowship programs that strengthen foreign language instruction, area/international studies teaching and research, professional development for educators, and curriculum development at the K-12, graduate, and postsecondary levels. Title VI programs offer domestic grants to institutions of higher education to develop and maintain capacity and performance in area/international studies and world languages.
Since 2006, CEAPS has been awarded four consecutive four-year Title VI grants. Since 2005, CEAPS has partnered with the East Asian Studies Center (EASC) at Indiana University Bloomington to form the East Asia National Resource Center Consortium, a Comprehensive National Resource Center. Designated as a National Resource Center in 2014, the IL/IN Consortium comprises the largest EA faculty concentration and one of the most rigorous EA training programs in the Midwest. These Title VI grants fund programs at four levels: East Asia National Resource Center Consortium activities, language instruction development at the University of Illinois, postsecondary education outreach, and K-12 outreach.