Maloney Interdistrict Magnet School (MIMS) is the only elementary school in Waterbury that has a world language program and is one of only two elementary Japanese programs in Connecticut. In the past 15 years, more than 1500 students have participated in its Japanese Language and Culture (JLC) Program in grades Prekindergarten through 5th. The JLC Program acts as an important "magnet" in attracting students from other districts to the school entrance lottery. Japanese language instruction arrived at MIMS thanks to block grants that the State of Connecticut had received under the federal Foreign Language Assistance Program (FLAP). These funds targeted "Critical" languages such as Japanese, Chinese, Arabic, Korean, and Russian. The school committee tasked with choosing which language to introduce was impressed with a visit to the East Hartford-Glastonbury Magnet School Japanese Program. They also decided that Japanese would be the most feasible in terms of finding a teacher and materials. The school received the grant for Japanese with matching funds from the City of Waterbury and hired its first teacher in January 1994 to begin a program in grades K-2. MIMS received FLAP funding once again in 1996 to expand to the upper grades. By 1998, the Interdistrict Magnet School Operating Grant funds fully supported the program and in 2002, the document "Building Upon Success: The Impact of FLAP Grants" cited the MIMS as an outstanding example of a successful program that had begun and continued with FLAP funding. In this article, the authors discuss how this program managed to survive and thrive all of these years.