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922 NRCSE members = 67,602 children – National Resource Centre for Supplementary Education
www.supplementaryeducation.org.uk

Joining NRCSE means that your achievement is counted

922 NRCSE members since 2011, teaching 67,602 children.

562 teaching maths

418 doing sport

771 schools teaching a language other than English.

59% will be affected by cuts in GCSE/A levels.

18% are teaching a language that doesn’t have GB exam eg. ‪#‎Somali‬, ‪#‎Albanian‬, ‪#‎Lithuanian‬, ‪#‎Yoruba‬, ‪#‎Tamil‬, ‪#‎Twi‬ and many more. ‪

#‎SupplementarySchools‬ are an incredible resource – value them! Join together.

 

See below the campaigning being facilitated by us all through Speak to the Future

What are the reasons for the discontinuation of these qualifications?

The main reasons given by Awarding Bodies are:

• A small number of entries means that it is not cost-effective to redevelop the qualifications under the new, tighter assessment requirements, and there are difficulties in the statistical underpinning of grade boundaries
• The more rigorous conditions attached to the new A-level specifications, and the need to teach and assess cultural content as well as language skills
• Difficulties sourcing examiners and other experts

For further information, see this briefing prepared by Professor Katrin Kohl, University of Oxford: Languages qualifications from 2017 incl. CIE -23 3 2015

Who will be affected by this?

The range of languages being withdrawn is very broad. They are currently taught both in mainstream state and independent schools, in adult and further education, and in supplementary schools provided by local communities. In this case, students may sit the exam in their mainstream school or college, but prepare for it in their own time.

As is also the case with French, German and Spanish, candidates include a mixture of bilingual native speakers, learners who have some ‘background exposure’ to the language, and those who have learnt the language from scratch in a school, college or adult education context.

In 2014, nearly 4000 candidates sat the affected languages at A level, an increase of 50% since 2004. With the exception of Urdu, Gujarati, Greek and Bengali, entries for all the affected languages have increased since 2004, in a context where entries for French and German have dropped by a third.

According to research by the National Resource Centre for Supplementary Education (representing 922 schools teaching over 67,000 pupils) these reforms will affect 59% of supplementary schools teaching a language (in addition to the 13% whose languages already lack a qualification).

What are the wider implications?

The decision has serious implications for the future supply of language skills that Britain needs. In 2014 the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Modern Languages launched its Manifesto for Languages calling for step change in the UK’s national capacity in foreign languages. Without an enhanced capacity in language skills:

• our economy will suffer as British firms are held back from trading across the world
• our young people will suffer as they lose out in a global jobs market,
• our international reputation and capacity for global influence will suffer,
• our defence and security interests abroad will be damaged, and
• our cultural capital at home will be impoverished.

The decision has particular implications for:

• schools which teach or wish to develop the teaching of a more diverse range of languages
• communities which speak or learn the languages in which examinations are being withdrawn
• individuals who wish to learn them

For further evidence and discussion, see:

http://www.speaktothefuture.org/about/why-languages/

http://www.alcantaracoms.com/why-we-need-our-community-languages-exams/