Free Languages for All courses are likely to be scrapped as a cost saving measure, York Vision understands.
The popular courses taken by hundreds of students will still be offered to new undergraduates this year, but may be cancelled from September 2017.
University registrar David Duncan said from 2017, “the University’s Board has decided that we will limit the amount we spend on [LFA] to £150,000 a year. We are still considering exactly how these funds should best be deployed.”
The decision would be a massive reduction to the LFA budget, which currently stands at around £400k.
First year history undergraduate Grace Shin, who takes French on LFA, said scrapping free courses would be a “disastrous idea.”
She said: “LFA is one of the main reasons why I chose York as my first choice, and it has opened many doors to me, including a year abroad.”
Third year English literature and linguistics student Oisín Twomey Brenner said cutting free LFA lessons would be “frankly disgraceful as it displays a short-sightedness on the part of the university as to the importance of language learning.”
Through LFA students can learn a variety of languages, from Italian, to Japanese, to Classical Latin. It is as yet unclear how the budget change would affect LFA modules taken as part of a degree.
YUSU President Ben Leatham said LFA courses are a “fantastic opportunity” but “under 60% of people actually complete the course.”
He added: “From my understanding the University are planning to streamline the service to ensure the students who will benefit from it most will be the focus.”
If Classical Latin is cut this would be cultural vandalism. Efforts to teach this beautiful language, which has formed the basis of the civilised world and is still heard in numerous Mass liturgies throughout the world weekly (though ideally more should do so) should be preserved.
From my experiences of LFA, the people who sign up to do it aren’t interested. It is dominated by English students who have to do it for a 2nd year language module, a few history, maybe linguistics students who have to do it for credit, and then the very few people who show up to actually be passionate about the course. To be honest it probably is worth cutting resources, no-one uses it properly. But I think English Lit need to be reviewed for it. If they made it compulsory that students need to finish the course and get a good mark, I am sure that 60% completion rate will climb rapidly.
I also think the teaching of LFAs could be a bit more pro-active. It’s difficult showing up each week just to move on to the next page in a text book, especially when there is no re-cap on the week before or anything to go by in terms of making sure you understand the stuff.
It’s a fantastic department, which we are very lucky to have. It shouldn’t be forced away.
This is sad, because it will deprive a lot of students of the chance to go on exchange- and thus fundamentally challenges the idea that York wants to be a more global university. When I went on exchange, all the state school students going had got to the right level through the free LFA Course and it was doing the LFA course that gave us the confidence to apply to go abroad.
Admittedly not everyone will want to or be able to go on exchange, but the language options also add to everyone´s chances outside University and for many students (like me) it was the first time I realised that I could learn a foreign language, after attending a secondary school where the highest target grade in French was a D. It also has contributed to my opportunity to spend time at the BBC and to pursue my desired career. For others I met, it was a chance to de-stress from their Physics degree by learning Dutch or Arabic. Finally, for everyone it was a chance to engage not only with another language but another culture… again, something one would expect a global university to promote. If York wishes to remain competitive, then schemes like first free year of LFA are important for levelling the playing field for students, and giving everyone a chance to try something that in other countries is taken for granted: regularly speaking a foreign language.
However, only one disclaimer I will add. The price of LFA has doubled in 10 years from about 60 pounds in 2004 to about 120 pounds in 2014. If the only alternative offered is to massively increase the general fees for students, then it seems fairer to me personally to offer a reduced fee for first years (20 pounds? 30 pounds?) and/or to make it possible to pay for the first term only rather than commit to the whole year. (Why is this not possible for large courses like French level 3 where there were 4 classes or so, and where it should be possible to run simultaneous times that then merge if everyone drops out?) In my experience, one of the things that kept attendance high was the percentage of second and third years who had paid, and they motivated the rest, so it would be stupid to price them out… but I rather fear that will be part of this plan too…