Support by the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills for the Welcoming Languages project

The Welcoming Languages project report has come to the attention of the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills, Shiley-Anne Somerville (BPA, MSP). Thanks to the support by Kaukab Stewart (MSP) who brought the report to the attention of the Cabinet Secretary, we received a letter in which the Cabinet Secretary expresses her “support for the aims of the project and its success in achieving those aims” and in which she also undertakes to “share details about the Welcoming Languages project and the Parliamentary event with Education Scotland staff who lead on languages and those who lead on health and wellbeing. My officials will invite the relevant Education Scotland leads to consider the relevance of this project to wider activity across schools, and to consider how they might share the learning with wider networks across Scotland”.

This is an excellent outcome for the Welcoming Languages project and we hope that this will lead to the introduction of more of the languages spoken by ‘New Scots’ in Scottish schools, also by teaching these languages to staff in education so they can further inclusion of all children and families by welcoming in their own language to contribute to their wellbeing and to making them feel part of the school community from day one.

The Welcoming Languages project on Mother Language Day

On the 21st of February Giovanna illustrated the project at Edinburgh City Chambers. The occasion was International Mother Language Day and we were invited to talk about the project by the Edinburgh and Lothian Regional Equality Council (ELREC) and Foysol Choudhury (MSP and ELREC Chair). You can read about the event in ELREC’s March newsletter.

Cross Party Motion on the Welcoming Languages project

On the 10th of February, Kaukab Stewart (MSP) tabled a motion Parliament welcomes publication of the final report, Welcoming Languages: Including a refugee language in Scottish education (Motion n. S6M-07847) to raise further awareness of the project with all MSPs. The Welcoming Languages project is now in the official parliament record. This is a further way of acknowledging the project and its aims, as well as a call to make it more widely available.