Young people in Britain aren’t bad at learning languages – but the school system doesn’t make it easy for them

By Abigail Parrish, Lecturer in Languages Education, University of Sheffield

According to a senior British diplomat, British young people’s poor language skills played a role in the UK’s decision not to stay in the Erasmus+ European student exchange programme after Brexit.

“There’s always been an imbalance between our inability to speak languages very well and therefore to take advantage of the outward mobility opportunities, and people wanting to come to the UK,” Nick Leake told a committee meeting in Brussels, as reported by…

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