All undergraduate students at Soka University of America must study a non-native language. The languages offered are Spanish, French, Mandarin Chinese, and Japanese. The language must be studied for two years, then all undergraduate students at Soka University of America study abroad for one semester in the spring or fall of their junior year in a country whose language they are studying (costs included in tuition). SUA was the first liberal arts college in the US to require mandatory study abroad for all students when it opened in 2001. The first students went abroad in 2004.