Switzerland: Language programme aims to boost integration

Switzerland: Language programme aims to boost integration

Via SwissInfo:

The Federal Migration Office has launched a language training system specifically defined around the integration needs of migrants. The course will be gradually introduced in collaboration with the cantons from the summer.

Called “FIDE – learn, teach and assess French, Italian and German in Switzerland”, the training system will become the nationwide norm for immigrant language training.

Its focus will be on giving immigrants the language competence needed to undertake such ordinary tasks such as consulting a doctor or attending parent-teacher meetings.

 (source)

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Austria: Kurz tackles immigration at school level

Austria: Kurz tackles immigration at school level

Via the Austrian Times:

Integration Secretary Sebastian Kurz, 26, was at the ministry of interior affairs this week discussing with educationalists whether schools were failing in their mission of integration.

(...)

Going further, he stated how: ‘In the capital, the percentage of people of migrant stock rises to 39%. Vienna like many other European capitals has 150 languages spoken in its schools. At primary school level, one in two pupils is of a migration background, mostly from the Balkans and Turkey.

Under the motto, ‘Integration through achievement’, the question of language was a major theme as schools are frequently the last bastions of community in urban settings. Some Viennese schools in districts like Brigitenau and Ottakring have a migrant intake that is over 80%. 

(source)

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Netherlands: Moroccan, Polish criminals speak each other's language

Netherlands: Moroccan, Polish criminals speak each other's language

Via De Telegraaf:

Acting police chief in the Haaglanden district, Paul van Musscher, says that Moroccan youth speak with their criminal colleagues in Polish and vice versa.

Van Musscher says this shows there's a melting pot in the neighborhoods and that they have close contacts with each other as they enter the criminal world.  "By speaking each other's language you create new trade relations.  This is truly a 'VOC mentality' of which Balkenende will probably not be proud."

Former Dutch PM Balkenende used the term 'VOC mentality' (Dutch East India Company) to encourage Dutch entrepreneurship.

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Belgium: Nationalists want language requirement for voting rights

Belgium: Nationalists want language requirement for voting rights

Via VRT:

Belgium's largest party, the opposition Flemish nationalist N-VA, wants to ensure that only non-EU foreigners who speak the local language can exercise their vote.

Lawmaker Ben Weyts: "There should be conditions linked to integration, e.g. knowledge of the language of the local area where you are living. In Flanders this means knowledge of Dutch. If you want to have a say in the administration of your municipality, you should also have the politeness to become familiar with the language of the municipality. If it's up to us, then we favour linking language conditions, integration conditions, to acquiring Belgian nationality and casting your vote."

(source)

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Sweden: More illiterates at Swedish language courses

Sweden: More illiterates at Swedish language courses

Via Stockholm News:

An increasing number of the students at the Swedish for Immigrants (SFI) courses are illiterates according to the public radio broadcaster SR International. Compared with 2006, the number of students with only one or two years of elementary school has doubled. However, according to SR International, the SFI courses are not adapted to this new reality.

One example is an SFI-course in Tensta, northwest Stockholm, where one out of four students has small or none school experience. Most of them are women and they have big difficulties to manage in everyday life.

(source)

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