Any thoughts on the future of Erasmus?

[GlitterBiscuits]

I wondered if anyone had any insider knowledge on what might happen?
Anyone with DC thinking about doing it?

My DS wants to go to an EU Uni in September 2021. I think it's in jeopardy at the moment

The MFL courses with a good reputation are mainly in the RG universities plus a few of the others such as Bath. There are not enough talented linguists to go round so other universities don’t need to offer the courses. To some extent this might make it easier to secure and develop relationships with other universities.

I do remember when DD was planning her year abroad that her university counselled that only Swiss and German universities were organised. Some others they thought were chaotic. I can confirm her Italian choice lived up to its “Chaotic” reputation! Despite being the highest rated uni in Italy. The Swiss uni ran like clockwork: as you might expect.

I think the universities will have worked on this eventuality but there must be great uncertainly. DD’s boyfriend was set to go to one Grande Ecole and in August he heard it had been changed to another one. The former had accepted too many students apparently. Two of DDs friends had teaching positions cancelled at the last minute and had to switch to uni placements. All at the last minute. These anecdotes are now 7 years ago but you can appreciate the issues are now multiplied in 2022.

When I say other universities. I mean other EU universities.

Disclaimer: I am a Remainer academic researcher who benefits massively from EU Horizon 2020 and ERC grants.

But I do think that Erasmus is not the best use of EU funds, certainly from a U.K. point of view. The students we have sent on Erasmus have been middle class, white Sophies and Ed’s, who’ve already had large amounts of exposure to Europe already. Erasmus has been a great experience for them, but hardly transformative. I’d feel far happier if there was any serious attempt at outreach for the demographics who don’t usually participate.

How are you seriously going to get a different demographic doing MFL when it’s not taken seriously in so many schools? The more deprived the area, the less likely you will find MFL students. The schools need to encourage MFL and parents too. How often do you see parents saying dc give up MFL on MN threads? All the time.

We know the independent schools still value MFL and other schools don’t care about it. Exam entries lessen each year. So the student body reflects this.

I guess I’m the mum of a “Sophie”. However Dd did not have exposure to much at all and didn’t do any MFL until y7. However her school noticed she was talented and she had good teaching. I’m not going to apologise for her getting an Erasmus Grant. She’s bright and now does a job that benefits society. Just because she’s middle class I resent her being seen as unworthy in terms of her education. Would you say that about scientists who go abroad to study? Surely we need everyone to do as well as possible? Whoever they are. But schools and parents need to wake up to studying MFL and going abroad.

I’ve pointed out to my DN that her course offers study abroad. But she’s unsure of its benefits and not interested. It’s out of her comfort zone and her parents think it’s not for the likes of her. Too much effort. So limitations from upbringing rule and anyone to say go for it is missing in their lives. Other dc are alive to the advantages and want it. I don’t care if they are mc. Maybe they then deserve to go? That’s not the fault of Erasmus.

It’s complete hyperbole to say that anyone sees your daughter as unworthy in terms of her education. What I am saying is that I don’t think it’s a fair use of public money to spend it on young adults who are already fairly well off by many metrics. It’s not like Preston Poly is sending hoards of people on year abroads to Europe, is it?

In my field there are loads of outreach programmes to get students from non traditional backgrounds into the subject (science) and environment (Oxbridge). They are well funded and taken seriously by the university administration. I simply don’t see the same efforts being put in by the Alliance Francaise, or the Goethe Institute. If languages are so important, then why aren’t more organisations demanding they be taken seriously?

I think it’s a real shame that Erasmus funding is in jeopardy. But frankly, the current setup is/was a luxury and difficult to justify without some serious demonstration as to why it helps those from backgrounds not traditionally part of pro-EU communities.

And actually, to your last point it is the fault of Erasmus. If the scheme is taking considerable amounts of public money and making no effort whatsoever to encourage people like your DN to apply, making no effort to say, actually, we can help you get your head around why Erasmus is for the likes of you, then it really is a middle class bauble that’s only for those with some degree of privilege.

When the Tories decided that a language other than English was no longer required study to GCSE level, the writing was on the wall, especially in lower socio-economic areas/schools.

Well now hardly anyone has a chance to study abroad, regardless of their social class. As if the Tories are going to replace Erasmus with a scheme that includes a wider demographic. Instead, everyone will miss out.

When I did Erasmus, there was funding attached so you got more of a grant during your year abroad than at a UK university, so it wasn't the funding that was an issue in the lack of deprived students going abroad. That reflects attitudes acquired at school and general disparities in university attendance.

My kids aren’t Sophie and Ed’s. I wish we could afford that access but me studying then self employed and now excluded from SEISS means we are at the bottom of our finances.
Dc1/2 should have benefited (dc1this year). Dc3 certainly likely to be interested and possibly dc4.
I certainly couldn’t pay and we’ve been abroad once in the last 10 years so they’ve little chance to travel with us.

We're a low income family, and DC would certainly have benefited from Erasmus.
There are other ways to get them the chance of immersion in another language. It won't be the same, but it's do-able. For example, DC has been on quite a few language exchanges to other countries. That costs very little (just the flight, and of course you entertain the exchange partner). They can do that up to age 18 at least.
Once they're 18, they can spend time abroad volunteering or as aupairs. They may be able to get summer jobs teaching English.
If you look online, there are options out there.

@QueenoftheAir in fairness it was Labour who did that I'm pretty sure

https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/society-and-culture/death-modern-foreign-languages-schools-university-jo-johnson-french-german-ebacc

@2magpies1pigeon

We're a low income family, and DC would certainly have benefited from Erasmus. There are other ways to get them the chance of immersion in another language. It won't be the same, but it's do-able. For example, DC has been on quite a few language exchanges to other countries. That costs very little (just the flight, and of course you entertain the exchange partner). They can do that up to age 18 at least. Once they're 18, they can spend time abroad volunteering or as aupairs. They may be able to get summer jobs teaching English. If you look online, there are options out there.

We’ve never had the space to have someone here. Had the option numerous times.

The exchange partners shared my DD's room - bunk bed. Including the boy. It worked very well.

Well I'm quite excited to see what the Turing scheme will offer our students and am hopeful that it will be a good replacement to the current scheme.

My daughter is currently on an Erasmus year abroad and speaking to her she does think that there's a certain type of student that takes advantage of it - in her experience they are more likely to be 'Sophie & Eds', whether this will change under the Turing scheme will remain to be seen.

@2magpies1pigeon

The exchange partners shared my DD's room - bunk bed. Including the boy. It worked very well.

My kids were already sharing. We didn’t have a spare bed.

That's a shame. My DD's language exchanges were the highlights of her secondary school life. I wish we'd been able to do it earlier though. It wasn' t possible for us when she was at primary. If I could do things differently, I'd go back in time and organise a couple of 6 month exchanges at the age of 9 or 10. As it is, she speaks her languages well, but she's far from fluent.
The kind of exchange where the children go to school will be far more problematic post-Brexit.

Speaking as a secondary school teacher of 15 years those kind of it changes are really difficult even within the EU. there's so much red tape to get through, so much convincing of parents and students and although it's a cheap option for a trip abroad as a previous poster has said it's sometimes really difficult for families to find space in their homes to host a student.

ERASMUS is going. I read a detailed article on it a few days back and it seems Boris has already spoken on this. UK is no longer EU. I wouldn't have expected ERASMUS and similar to be a priority for Boris in terms of retention anyway

[quote avenueq]@QueenoftheAir in fairness it was Labour who did that I'm pretty sure[/quote]
You're absolutely right. It was 2004 I think. The proportion of children taking a language GCSE fell dramatically when it stopped being compulsory at key stage 4. The much-maligned EBacc is designed to encourage schools to increase the take-up of languages at GCSE.

I was really interested to read the comments from @DazzlePaintedBattlePants which bear out my suspicions about Erasmus. I heard Michael Gove being interviewed this morning on the Turing Scheme. It sounds very encouraging and I hope it does manage to attract a wider range of pupils than Erasmus does.

It wasn’t compulsory for long as I did GCSEs in the late 2990s and wasn’t for us.

Late 1990s 😳 I’m not from the future 😳

twitter.com/Cardwell_PJ/status/1342917640797483008

What a waste.

DD is doing a 'with French' (as opposed to, just doing a 'year abroad') degree and as such, was only eligible for the Erasmus options. As she says, though, no point trying to find someone to pester about it in the middle of the Christmas holidays.

We organised our language exchanges privately, via Lingoo. It's usually very straightforward. We had one disaster, but lots of successes.
I do agree though that most UK families would not be prepared to send their children to a family they've never met, without any back-up from the school. Which is a pity.