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  • Born global: implications for higher education1

Introduction

Language study to degree level is of great value to individuals, to the economy and to the cultural and intellectual life of the nation. Yet these benefits are under-appreciated.

Many young people, even those emerging from university with single or joint honours language qualifications, may undervalue the range of skills they have developed through that study.2

Investigations carried out for Born Global, the British Academy’s project on demand for linguistic and intercultural communication skills among employers, show that many businesses have a need for the qualities that language graduates can bring to their workforces, a need which is not currently being met. Furthermore, the project has identified a belief among many employers that economic opportunities are being lost where such recruits are in short supply.

Other studies have shown an unmet demand for specific language skills in the diplomatic and armed forces fields, while the growth of English as the global lingua franca has, paradoxically perhaps, created a need for interpreters and translators into English from many languages which is not currently being satisfied.3 Language degrees, however, equip students with much more than technical linguistic competence, requiring individuals to demonstrate qualities [End Page 258] of rigorous thinking, problem-solving and resilience – among others – which are useful to employers. As technological change and travel make the world more inter-connected, the need for people to understand diverse cultures is growing and becoming more urgent, rather than shrinking.

Yet language study is facing a struggle to be seen as relevant by young people growing up in a world in which English is seen as globally dominant. The number of students enrolling for language degrees has shown a sharp decline, while until recently the proportion of young people taking the subjects even to the age of 16 or 18 in school has also been falling. And, though our evidence suggests employers value the qualities that language graduates possess, would-be employees are clearly not receiving that message strongly enough.

What can be done to change this situation? This report considers the current state of language learning in England and discusses how findings from Born Global could help to bring about both a reversal of some of the more alarming trends facing these subjects in higher education and a realization of the potential of language learning to enhance careers, intellects, the economy and the cultural life of the nation.

Opportunity alongside challenge: the context of language learning in England

The word “crisis” has featured in recent media reports of the state of the subject in schools and universities, and there is no doubt that the rise of English to the status of global lingua franca presents a challenge to advocates for linguistic study as they seek to demonstrate why languages remain important.4

Yet there are positive developments to report. Government reforms of school education, in particular the decision to require all English primary schools to teach a language to their pupils from the age of 7 and, in secondary schools, to advocate and push for the learning of languages to age 16 for the vast majority of young people, represent an important commitment to languages while holding out the long-term hope of increasing the number of young people engaged with, and committed to, the study of languages and their associated literatures and cultures. [End Page 259]

In higher education, Institution-Wide Language Provision (IWLP) courses, which offer students the chance to study languages alongside, or as a minor part of, their degree courses, have also proved successful. Routes into Languages, a programme established in 2006 to promote the value of language study in schools and universities, has reached hundreds of thousands of young people.

However, there is no doubt that the overall context for language learning is extremely challenging. Professor Michael Worton’s 2009 review of modern language provision in higher education described the academic community as feeling “vulnerable – and, indeed, beleaguered” and there is little sense that this has changed substantively in the intervening years.

The next section of this report considers opportunities alongside the challenges of the coming years for languages.

Potential

Employers recognizing potential value of languages...

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