Oral question asked in the House of Lords, by Baroness Walmsley (Liberal Democrat). It was answered on Thursday, 28 January 2010.

Education: Language Trends Survey

Question: My Lords, does the Minister accept that foreign exchange trips are really helpful to young people who are learning languages? Yet a lot of schools are very reluctant to carry them out; indeed, the survey says that only 40 per cent of schools have them. What are the Government doing to help schools overcome the practical difficulties, and the anxieties of parents about the safeguarding of their children and the vetting procedures in the foreign countries concerned?

Answer: I will have to get back to the noble Baroness about the safeguarding; I have no comment on that. However, there are other ways to achieve the same benefits. For example, there is a good project, Connecting Classrooms, which uses the internet as a way of achieving contact between schools from different countries. The British Council is involved in a number of those projects. I am not denying the importance of foreign trips. I am just saying that we ought to use the technology in imaginative ways to encourage young people to stay with language learning.

Secondary information