Language Programmes evaluation

The Institute for Employment Studies (IES) and the National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR) have been commissioned by the Department for Education (DfE) to undertake a 3-year evaluation of four of the Department's Language Programmes:

• Language Hubs (LH)
• Language Assistants (LAs)
• The German Promotion Project (GPP)
• The UK-German Connection (UKGC)

The DfE’s Language Programmes support language provision in schools in England. These initiatives are designed to support the spread of best practice in language teaching, improve the KS2 – KS3 transition, and increase MFL exam entries especially at GCSE, and particularly amongst disadvantaged pupils.

The aim of the evaluation is to understand how schools are engaging with key programmes to support schools, teachers and pupils with language learning and teaching, how these programmes interact and any impacts for teachers and pupils, e.g. increased take-up of languages at GCSE. We would also like to understand what language teaching looks like at different schools. Your school may currently be participating in one or more of the language programmes listed or it may be participating in none of these programmes. We have selected a range of schools in order to understand different language teaching approaches in a range of contexts. It is important to note that the research is NOT an evaluation of individual schools, staff, or delivery partners.

Where schools are engaging with one or more of the programmes, we are interested in how the programme is playing out, what is working well and what could be improved. These findings are important and are being fed back to DfE to inform how the programme is delivered going forward. The research began in January 2024 and will finish in October 2026.

Overview of the research

The evaluation will gather, synthesise, and triangulate evidence from a range of stakeholders to answer the research questions set by DfE. Different strands of the research focus on different Language Programmes or research questions so no school or individual would be expected to take part in all the evaluation activities. The evaluation activities include:

• Annual surveys of staff and students at all participating schools. There are two online surveys over the course of the first year of the evaluation and then two further annual surveys; one in summer term 2025 and one in summer term 2026.
• Interviews with teachers at schools that are either a Language Hub or are working with a Language Hub. Each year 25 teachers will be invited to participate in an interview.
• Interviews with German Expert Mentors (GEMS). Each year nine GEMs will be invited to participate in an interview. They do not need to be at a school that is participating in the evaluation.
• Longitudinal case studies at schools either delivering or working with a Language Hub. Each year six schools will be invited to be qualitative cases studies. Each year, the case study schools will receive a two-day visit to explore how Language Hubs work in practice. We may ask your school to be a case study for one year only or for two or three years.
• Annual surveys of English Language Assistants (ELAs) and Modern Languages Assistants (MLAs) employed through the British Council’s programme. ELAs and MLAs will be contacted directly via email and not through a host school.
• An impact evaluation of the Languages Hubs and British Council Language Assistants programmes. DfE analysts will analyse the National Pupil Dataset (NPD) data and Longitudinal Education Outcomes (LEO) data to look at take up of languages at GCSE/A-level and educational or career outcomes for ELAs.

What is involved for schools?

Working closely with schools is key to the success of the evaluation. We appreciate that the school year is very busy for staff and students, and we are keen to work with your school to minimise burden as much as possible. There are three aspects of the research where the evaluation team would like to ask for the support of schools - the annual surveys of teachers and staff, interviews with teachers and case studies. All schools taking part in the evaluation will be invited to participate in at least one of the above activities.

Annual surveys with staff and students

Some schools participating in the evaluation will be asked to identify and encourage language teachers and language assistants employed directly by the school to complete annual surveys. Schools that are a Language Hub will be asked to circulate the surveys to any staff involved in applying for, setting up or delivering the Language Hub as well. The surveys will be hosted online and can be access via a link or QR code. The surveys will take around 15 minutes to complete. The surveys will explore current language teaching, feedback on any Language Programmes they engage with, confidence and students’ attitudes to language. Surveys responses are anonymous, although individuals can choose to provide their email address to volunteer for interviews or if they are happy to be send a future survey links directly via their email address.

Some schools participating in the evaluation will be asked to support with the delivery of annual surveys with students at their school. The surveys are hosted online and can be accessed via a link or QR code. The surveys will take around 10 minutes to complete. We are anticipating that the student surveys would be completed during language lessons or form/registration period, to help ensure a good response rate. The student surveys explore whether they are learning any languages, their views on language learning, whether languages may be useful for a future career, whether they intend to continue learning a language and, where relevant, reasons why they have chosen not to learn any languages. Survey responses for students are entirely anonymous.

The teacher and student surveys both take place over the same time period and the table below presents the survey timings for each year of the evaluation. As previously described, all language teachers and any teachers involved in a Language Hub are invited to complete the teacher survey each year. For the student survey, we would like to survey specific year groups at specific time points so that we can follow those year groups’ attitudes and decision-making around languages over the evaluation. We will not be tracking individual students’ response but will look at the findings for overall year group over time. The table below sets out the year groups to be invited for each survey. Please circulate the survey to all students in that year group even if they don’t study any languages as we are also interested in why students choose not to study a language.

Interviews with teachers

Schools that either are a Language Hub or are working with a Language Hub may be asked to facilitate an interview with a language teacher at their school. This is likely to be a departmental head/lead. The interview will be about 45-60 minutes long, and will take place between April-June, the exact time to be determined in consultation with schools/teachers, so that we can find a time that works best for you. Interview topics will include your experiences of the Language Hub initiative to date, choices and decisions made about the languages offered by the school, and pedagogical approaches, any experience of Language Assistants; staff retention and recruitment and funding issues; the quality and usefulness of CPD; pupil enthusiasm and engagement, and parent/carer support. In schools delivering a Language Hub, we would like to request support with identifying a lead teacher at one of the Hub’s partner schools who might be interested in participating in a teacher interview.

Case studies

Schools that either are a Language Hub or are working with a Language Hub may be invited to become a case study. For the case study element, we would like to carry out a two-day visit to your school. We may ask your school to be a case study for one year only or for two or three years. If we ask your school to be a case study for several years, we would carry out one visit in each school year. The aim of the visits is to understand how your Language Hub, and language teaching more broadly, works at your school; or how your school engages with your local Language Hub. We will not be evaluating or judging any aspects of teaching and learning in any way. The aim is to understand what the Language Hubs, and language teaching more generally, look like in different schools.

The visits would take place in April-June, the exact time to be determined in consultation with your school, so that we can find a time that works best for you. As part of the visit, we would like to interview the language department lead and a language assistant (if relevant), observe two language lessons, and conduct two focus groups of 4-6 students, one with those who have not yet made GCSE choices, and one with those who have. All researchers will have enhanced DBS clearance. The evaluation team will be as flexible as possible, to fit around your schools’ needs and cause as little disruption as possible. We would also be interested in reaching out to two of your school’s feeder primaries to ask if we could interview any language teachers or senior leaders about their language teaching and would be grateful for any advice you may have on which schools to contact.

What happens to the information I share?

Participation in all research activities is voluntary. We operate in line with data protection legislation (GDPR): we will store your personal data securely; we will not use your personal data for any purpose other than this research, and your personal data will be deleted from our records at the end of the project. For the purpose of data protection legislation, the DfE is the data controller for the personal data processed as part of the evaluation. Further information on how we will handle your data can be found in the privacy policy for the project.

Findings from the research will be published in annual reports for each of the three years of the evaluation. Any quotes will be anonymised and individuals or schools will not be identifiable, unless we receive your permission, e.g. good practice examples. There will be two interim reports at the end of each year of the evaluation. The reports will present emerging findings to date which can then feed into policy development for the next stage of the programmes. The evaluation team will also feed back findings to DfE through as part of their regular catch-up meetings. The main research output will be the final report (September 2026) which will draw together all findings and data so far to address the research questions.

Who do I contact if I have any questions?

The Institute for Employment Studies (IES):
Ceri Williams, Project Director; Kate Alexander, Project Manager:language.programmes@employment-studies.co.uk

The National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR)
Carol Vincent, Project Manager: c.vincent@niesr.ac.uk

Department for Education
Lindsey Coleman, Evaluation Manager: lindsey.coleman@education.gov.uk