More businesses and schools are being urged to
sign up to the Business Language Champions (BLC)programme, which
has been instrumental in showing pupils how important languages can
be in the world of work.
It comes after research revealed that almost
300 businesses and 200 schools across England have now signed up to
the BLC programme – with 100 new businesses and 50 new schools
joining since March 2009.
The study by CILT, the National Centre for
Languages, also showed that languages come second only to IT in a
list of desirable skills for job candidates.
Sponsored by the Department for Schools,
Children and Families, BLC engages with businesses from a huge
range of sectors including creative & media, manufacturing,
sport & leisure, engineering – all of which recognise the
importance of language skills for developing business. Boots, IBM
and HSBC are just a few of the well-known organisations that have
got on board and teamed up with schools to give pupils an extra
incentive to want to continue with languages.
One partnership that is already impacting on
pupils’ motivation, despite only starting in January 2010, is one
between the Metropolitan Police and Stoke Newington School in North
London. At this Hackney school, the partnership aims to encourage
Turkish-speaking pupils to value and nurture their language skills,
by showing them how they could be put to use in an extremely
exciting career with the police.
Given the large Turkish population in the
area, police officers who can speak Turkish will always be in high
demand. The Met Police staff who visited the school demonstrated
this to the pupils by engaging them in a series of role plays that
showed how somebody might end up in a situation where Turkish would
be useful. They also took part in a ‘speed-dating’-style event
where pupils quizzed officers on the work they do.
Danielle Thom, Head of MFL at the school,
said: “The partnership is already having a very positive impact on
the pupils’ attitude to Turkish. Meeting the police officers
gives them real life examples of something they could aspire to,
and they are starting to see Turkish as an asset that could open
doors to them in the future.”
CILT hopes that more schools and business will
team up as part of BLC programme, so that more young people can be
made aware of the value of language skills in the workplace.
For more information on the programme, visit
our
website, have a look at our blog
or
sign up.