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<p>The institutional autonomy of English Higher Education (HE) providers is protected
by the Higher Education and Research Act 2017. This includes autonomy over which courses
to offer and which students to admit. The role of government is to create the right
conditions and incentives so that HE providers are able to help respond to our economic
and strategic priorities. We also want to enable students to make informed choices,
and for student demand to influence the decisions providers make on what to offer.</p><p>In
England, we agree that learning foreign language is important and believe that building
the skills and demand for degree courses starts in schools. That is why we are taking
a number of steps to support schools in encouraging uptake of language qualifications.</p><p>This
includes:</p><ul><li>Introducing the English Baccalaureate (EBacc) performance measure
in 2010 to halt the decline in the number of pupils taking GCSEs in the core academic
subjects. The reformed national curriculum now makes it compulsory for pupils in maintained
schools to be taught a foreign language in key stage 2.</li><li>Promoting the value
of language qualifications to students who are choosing their GCSEs and to their parents.
We recently published and promoted a guidance leaflet for parents, which explains
why studying a language, as part of the EBacc, broadens opportunities in both education
and employment. Additionally, in February we drew attention to the benefits of studying
a language among 13-14 year olds through a social media campaign.</li><li>Supporting
schools to increase languages take up through the £10 million Mandarin Excellence
Programme and through a £4.8 million modern foreign languages pedagogy pilot programme,
which will improve uptake and attainment in languages at key stages 3 to 4, particularly
for disadvantaged pupils.</li></ul>
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