AUSTRALIAN’S foreign language skills are declining, Voice of America has reported. New figures show that only 13 percent of high school graduates can speak a foreign language. But four decades ago, 40 percent had foreign language skills.
Professor Elise Tipton, from the University of Sydney, says increasingly students do not feel the need to learn another language to boost their career. She believes that Australia’s economic boom, which is driven by red-hot demand for its minerals, is helping mask serious deficiencies in its language skills.
Australia does business very successfully in English with most of its trading partners. But as the world’s economic power shifts to emerging regions such as Asia, its language gap could soon be exposed. According to the new figures, less than 6.5 percent of high school graduates are proficient in an Asian language. Academics worry that this means Australia will increasingly be isolated from its economically important Asian neighbors. Dilip Dutta, from the economics and business faculty at Sydney University, says language skills can enhance trading opportunities. If Australians want to trade with Asian countries, it is very important for them to learn the language that will help them to get closer to the culture. Through the use of Asian languages, they can come up with better trade negotiation or trade enhancement skills more easily.
But students have different opinions about Asian language learning. Pippa McCowage, a 22-year-old Australian student, says many young Australians have a half-hearted approach to foreign languages, and that the language curriculum is often weak. “While we’re encouraged in high school to learn another language, it’s not really apparent to me as a realistic expectation that you will have to speak it,” said McCowage. “For example, I learned Japanese in high school, when I went on an exchange in Year 10, I found that the Japanese students of my age had a much greater proficiency in English than I did in Japanese. So in that sense, it almost discourages you.”
McCowage’s classmate, Rob Tyson, blames Australia’s geographical isolation for declining interest in foreign languages. “There’s a big difference between speaking languages in class and then being able to spend a lot of time in a country where I need to be able to hold a conversation,” he commented.
At present,?about 70?percent of Australia’s major exports go to Asia and the Australian government has been keen on developing closer economic and diplomatic ties with Asia. Academics say that, as Asia becomes one of the world’s economic powerhouses, Australia needs to improve its language skills if it is to take full advantage of the business opportunities on its doorstep.
