Educational provision for modern foreign languages and Gaelic: FOI response

FOI reference: FOI/17/02103
Date received: 19 September 2017
Date responded: 17 October 2017

Information requested

1. The number of secondary school pupils studying one modern foreign language beyond Broad General Education.

2. The number of secondary school pupils studying two or more modern foreign languages beyond Broad General Education.

3. The number of secondary schools offering Gaelic as a subject.

4. The amount of money spent by the Scottish government 2016-2017 on the provision of Gaelic in secondary schools.

5. The amount of money spent by the Scottish government 2016-2017 for the promotion, encouragement and enhancement of, specifically, modern foreign languages in secondary schools.

6. The amount of money provided to all Scottish emergency services specifically for purposes related to the Gaelic language.

Response

We have provided a combined response to questions one and two, below.

1 and 2. Data is not held centrally on the subjects that secondary school pupils are currently studying.

3. There are 35 schools teaching Gaelic subjects and Gaelic Learner Education.

4. This information is not held centrally.

5. During 2016-17 the Scottish Government has provided £3m to local authorities for the promotion, encouragement and enhancement of modern foreign languages within the broad general education. Since 2013 the Scottish Government have provided a total of £24.2 million pounds in development funding to local authorities to assist with the implementation of the 1+2 language learning policy.

In addition, the Scottish Government provides grant funding of £700k to Scotland's National Centre for Languages (SCILT) and £754k to the Confucius Institute for Scotland's Schools (CISS) to support teachers, schools and local authorities with language teaching and learning.

6. The Scottish Government does not provide any funding to emergency services for the purposes related to the Gaelic language.

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses