According to an interesting article I found today, the UK government is planning to cut funding to Asset Programme, which provides classes in a wide range of language not usually covered in the regular school curriculum.
The languages are known as ‘community languages’ to distinguish them from modern languages, such as French, German, Spanish and Italian, and classical languages (Latin and Ancient Greek) which are included in the curriculum. They are Arabic, Bengali, Cantonese, Cornish, French, German, Greek, Gujarati, Hindi, Irish, Italian, Japanese, Mandarin, Punjabi, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Somali, Spanish, Swedish, Tamil, Turkish, Urdu, Welsh and Yoruba. This sounds like a useful initiative and it would be a great waste of talent if it’s cut.
Are there similar programmes in other countries?
