In order to improve the nation's capacity for teaching and learning foreign languages, the United States Department of Education provides grants under the Language Resource Centers program for the establishment and operation of centers that serve as national resources through teacher training, research, materials development, and dissemination projects. In 1990, the University of Hawai`i at Manoa was granted funds to develop the National Foreign Language Resource Center (NFLRC), one of three such centers at the time--the number has since grown to fourteen.

Drawing on institutional strengths at the University of Hawai`i in foreign language teaching, applied linguistics, and second language acquisition, the NFLRC undertakes projects that focus primarily on the less commonly taught languages of East Asia, Southeast Asia, and the Pacific. However, many of its projects have implications for the teaching and learning of all languages, and the overriding goal of all projects is to develop prototypes that can be applied broadly as resources to improve foreign language education nationally.

The NFLRC director is Richard Schmidt. A national advisory board, made up of scholars established in their fields, sets the general direction of the NFLRC and provides advice and evaluation for center projects.