“Let’s build a foundation of English skills that works for everyone…

“Launching on December 16 an ambitious plan to develop multilingualism in college, the National Education Minister bluntly stated: ‘Improving the general level of students in English is a major challenge for higher studies and professional integration”. Although half of ninth graders do not reach the desired level A2 goal when they enter high school, strengthening their muscles is indeed urgent. The English level of our fellow citizens is increasing. To speak the language of Shakespeare in their daily lives”.

According to An Ipsos survey Conducted in December 2022, nearly a third of French people say they speak English at least once a month as part of their work, an increase of five points in two years. We know the English language exposure of professionals in tourism, hotels and restaurants or security, especially in the run-up to the Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games, but it now spreads across all sectors of the economy and at all skill levels. .

Bad students of French

Unfortunately, the French are bad students of English and readily admit it. According to the aforementioned survey, more than one in two French people say they have a bad condition. Unfortunately, behind this observation hides a real obstacle to employment for fellow citizens who sometimes allow themselves to – more than one in three French people have already been denied a job or promotion because of their poor level of English. -Criticism – A third of the working population has already given up applying for jobs for the same reasons. This reality is hard to hear even as our country is undergoing unprecedented recruitment tensions and the President has made full employment a key objective of his second five-year term.

In the midst of the purchasing power crisis, the need to correct this situation is very important, because a good knowledge of a foreign language opens the way to a significant increase in income. According to A study of Asterès Released in autumn 2021, learning a language will allow an individual to see a net salary increase of 4,300 euros per year. For our country in the grip of an economic recession, a 10% increase in the number of multilingual speakers would lead to an improvement in the trade balance of 45 billion euros, which shows a deficit of 85 billion euros per year. Some training courses may claim such a return on investment.

Basic skills common to all branches

At a time when the government is engaging in consultation with social partners to ensure the sustainability of the funding system for continuing education, it is very wrong to want to sacrifice this essential skill on the altar of the need for savings. The French also understand this well: 85% of them reject the idea that some defend to remove English from the list of personal training accounts.

The coming reform, on the other hand, offers an opportunity to profoundly change the place of English in the world of work. Thanks to the creation of a base of linguistic skills that define a basic level in English for all professional branches, every worker can receive training to protect his career. If defined in consultation with the social partners, this new criterion will have a double advantage: for the employee, their mobility between branches and the possibility to guarantee their employment. For the company, it is guaranteed to hire employees with sufficient English knowledge to fully fulfill their duties.

English has a growing place in the daily lives of most of our fellow citizens. Whatever the motivations, turning a blind eye to it would do a very poor trick on the millions of French people who pass up career opportunities without being able to seize them.

Nathaniel Wright, Head of Wall Street English and Chairman of the Languages ​​Commission of Qualified Partners