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21st
AUG

GCSE results reveal new low for languages

Posted by Lucy under Cactus Languages Abroad

GCSE results hit another record high this year but it’s bad news for modern languages. The number of students studying has continued to nosedive since the Government abolished the requirement for all teenagers to study a foreign language beyond the age of 14 in 2004.

There have been falls year-on-year ever since the policy was introduced, from 547,189 pupils in 2003 to just 382,228 this year. There is also a widening north-south divide, with more than three-quarters of pupils in some northern areas dropping languages.

It’s inevitable that there will soon be a knock-on effect for employers, as they struggle to find employees with the necessary language skills to fill many roles. The Government urgently needs to reinstate languages as a core requirement for GCSEs if the UK doesn’t want to get completely left behind its multi-lingual economic competitors.

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