Annual Report 2023 Entire Book - Flipbook - Page 9
#ThinkLanguages continued to grow with 15,000 students from over 180 schools taking part. An exciting new
addition last year was the Champion Team prize which was a trip to Brussels. This was offered by the Department
of Foreign Affairs as part of their A Career for EU strategy and provided an additional incentive for engagement.
A re-engagement with stakeholders in the context of a review of the Languages Connect strategy and the
development of a new implementation plan was timely. There were many meetings with a wide range of
stakeholders including representatives of government departments, Higher Education Institutions (HEIs),
management bodies, teachers, embassies and cultural institutes, and enterprise agencies, discussing foreign
languages needs and opportunities as well as possible mechanisms for change. Research was facilitated on
student attitudes and feedback, and this also informed the progress report on implementation of the strategy.
Collaboration with the HEIs progressed, in particular in the context of the summit, #ThinkLanguages, and
summer camps. A hundred schools were visited by the HEIs, and more than a thousand students took part in
workshops and taster classes provided by the HEIs during #ThinkLanguages Week which ensured that thousands
of students were given the opportunity to think more about the importance and the relevance of foreign
languages as well as the fun of doing a language in college. Such collaboration is key to strengthening
participation in third level language learning courses and building capacity in foreign languages for the future.
Other highlights of the year from some of the very special people we are so fortunate to have working at PPLI
included the feedback from schools around the country explaining how new books in a variety of home
languages had enhanced school libraries and how much the students and pupils were enjoying accessing
materials in their own languages; seeing languages provision invigorated as a result of whole school advisory
sessions, getting positive feedback as a result of increased engagement with Foreign Language Assistants, the
light that was shone on CLIL at the Summit; and an increase in the numbers of teachers of the more recently
added curricular languages getting registered with the Teaching Council.
We couldn’t do this without our wider team also which includes our associates, teachers and you, the
stakeholders. Thank you for all your support and collaboration which is invaluable to each one of us. Please feel
welcome to visit us at the Digital Hub to see how we might further capitalise on the synergies we have and
increase the value of our work.
In the meantime, thank you also for reading our annual report.
Karen Ruddock
Director PPLI
- PPLI ANNUAL REPORT 2023 -
9
