Language exams to be stopped!

#supplementaryschools encourage your parents to approach their child(ren)’s mainstream school and ask for them to be entered for language GCSEs.

After so much work to obtain British exams in these languages and more work to get them valued and recognised by universities they are now under threat.

Once these language exams are cut it will be exceedingly difficult/impossible to get them back.

At present AQA examination board are going to develop new GCSEs for Bengali, Mandarin, Italian, Modern Hebrew, Panjabi, Polish and Urdu but they are dropping A levels for Bengali, Modern Hebrew, Panjabi and Polish.

OCR examination board are dropping Dutch, Gujarati, Persian, Portuguese and Turkish GCSEs and A levels.

EdExcel examination board are currently offering Arabic, Chinese, Italian, Japanese, Modern Greek, Russian, Spanish and Urdu and are keeping it close to their chests which ones they will redevelop under the new examination criteria for teaching from 2017. Might be all, some or none of the above.

Try to get your local newspapers and television to cover this, let us know what you can do. We are working on a co-ordinated campaign and speaking to ministers at the Houses of Parliament next week.

It is important to appreciate that this has been done for economic reasons by the examination boards, ie. not enough entries for these exams (see below). Education is about more than money! But it would send a powerful message if we could double the entries for the languages under threat.

For A levels, it is you the supplementary schools that have the biggest role to play. Young people can not achieve these exams without teaching and support. What specific help do you need to retain your young people’s interest? Is it more teacher training? Better IT resources? Tell us so we can lobby for support and resources for you.