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RLN (Regional Language Network) was launched in 2005 and it has received investment from the South West of England Regional Development Agency (RDA) as well as funding from DfES (Department for Education and Skills) to help prevent businesses from missing out on trading in other countries, by putting them in touch with local language providers who can help bridge the gap. It followed an audit of South West firms which found that an astonishing 20% admitted to having lost businesses because of a language or culture barrier. And 49% of respondents recognised having come up against a language barrier of some form and 23% said they felt they had met cultural barriers in their work.
Our school and Centrax, an international engineering company based in Newton Abbot, are working together in order to raise the profile of Modern Foreign Languages and to ensure that our students realise the importance of being able to speak other languages than English and that British companies need to be able to employ staff with good language skills.
Centrax is one of 12 businesses in the South West of England taking part in a pioneering initiative by the Regional Language Network South West, called "Business Language Champions". Centrax won the award last year for their wide use of languages in their business, -they can speak 7 different languages among their staff. The scheme aims to encourage students to continue with their language studies at school to meet the needs of businesses trading in an international market.
Torquay Boys' Grammar School students benefit tremendously as they see how languages are put into practice and they see the languages being used for real in an international company. Students see Centrax staff using languages and realise the importance of knowing how to communicate in other languages. Students use authentic materials from the company: ie. faxes and letters to customers, the company's magazine, different project sheets with information, etc. It gives the students a totally new dimension to their learning.
Some students can do their work experience at Centrax, so far six students have done work experience at Centrax. A Year 12 student impressed the staff at Centrax while doing his work experience so much that he was offered a paid job during the summer holidays.
Centrax is a brilliant example of a company that is looking to the future. They are investing a lot of time and hard work in supporting the work that we do at school so that our students of today realize the importance of having the language skills needed so that they can become the business leaders of tomorrow.
The South West is the first region in the country to pilot the Business Language Champions programme and it is hoped that it helps to highlight the importance of bringing businesses and schools together and to help students understand how speaking a foreign language and understanding other cultures can help improve a company's business opportunities in today's global economy.
It is a very positive experience for all those involved: students, staff at school and staff at Centrax, with good friendships developing between the school and the company. There is a lot of excitement at school among students who can see that their learning of languages is not just something that they are doing at school because we are a Language College.
CILT and Torquay Boys' Grammar School
In 2006 Torquay Boys' Grammar School was selected to be the lead school in the CILT "14 -19 Languages Network" in the South West and we have been given funding to organise and host language events during the year to promote language learning among Secondary School students.
On 1st November 2006, Torquay Boys' Grammar School hosted a "Making Languages Our Business" convention in which people from the education (Secondary and University) and business sector are getting together to discuss the current situation with languages and to study ways in which we can all promote the studying of languages at any level for 14-19-year-old students and to encourage them to take languages as part of their degree at University which will benefit them enormously in the future.
On February 6th 2007 Torquay Boys' Grammar School organised the first Making Languages Our Business event for Torbay's Year 9/10 students which took place at Exeter University. Students had the opportunity to take part in business simulations and hands-on activities as well as a Chinese lecture by a University Professor in a proper lecture room. Eight sixth formers from Torquay Boys' Grammar School helped with the activities, we also had undergraduate students who helped during the morning and gave a tour of the campus to all the students after lunch, -this gave an excellent insight to all our students about life at university. Making Languages Our Business is an annual event in Torbay with around 90 students taking part each year.
Torquay Boys' Grammar School is in contact with a representative from the Business Link and we have sent a letter and an audit to over 200 local businesses in order to establish closer links with the local businesses so that businesses and local secondary schools can work in collaboration to promote languages among the Torbay students.
We do need the businesses' and Torbay Head Teachers' support in order to make our youngsters understand the importance of having one or more languages as they are an invaluable tool in today's global economy.
