Young people and the UK economy are losing out because of a dismissive and shortsighted attitude to language teaching.
Young people and the UK economy are certainly losing out badly because of a dismissive and shortsighted attitude to language teaching (“Schools are teaching pupils to be linguistic paupers of Europe”, May 15). Sadly, your report that a modern language will become a compulsory part of primary school education from 2011, is wrong. This was the plan, but the statutory authority to do it was one of the provisions in the Children, Schools and Families Bill abandoned by the political parties in the parliamentary “wash-up” process before the general election.
Languages after the age of 14 remain optional in more than three-quarters of state schools. More than 83 per cent don’t bother to set a benchmark for take-up and even the school’s self-assessment process for Ofsted inspections no longer includes a specific question on language teaching. GCSE entries are in decline, a third of university modern languages departments have closed in the past seven years, and employers are recruiting from overseas to meet their language needs because they cannot find what they want from UK- educated school-leavers or graduates.
Research suggests that the UK economy could be losing up to £21 billion a year in lost contracts because of lack of language skills in the workforce. By contrast, export businesses that are using language skills report sales levels up by 45 per cent. A survey of graduate earnings showed that, three and a half years after graduation, modern language graduates earn more than those from any other discipline except medicine, architecture and pharmacology. State schools do their pupils a great disservice by excluding them from one of the skills that would maximise their employability, not to mention depriving them of a great social asset, fun and pleasure.
It is a myth that English is enough. Only six per cent of the Earth’s population are native English speakers and 75 per cent speak no English at all. In the past decade, even the amount of internet traffic in English has declined from 51 to 29 per cent, while the content in Chinese has risen from 5 to 20 per cent.
Every young person in the 21st century needs and deserves a measure of modern language competence every bit as much as they need IT skills, English and maths. The Government must act quickly, in conjunction with schools, universities and employers, to ensure this happens, or face an ever-increasing competitive disadvantage in a global economy and a humiliating decline in our ability to function in and contribute to international bodies.