Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps he is taking to encourage more people from disadvantaged backgrounds to study the Classics.

Since September 2014, the reformed national curriculum makes it compulsory for pupils in maintained schools to be taught a modern or classical language in Key Stage 2. The Department introduced the English Baccalaureate (EBacc) performance measure in 2010 where entry into an ancient language GCSE (Latin, Ancient Greek and Biblical Hebrew) counts towards the languages element of the EBacc. Entry into ancient history GCSE counts towards the humanities element.

The Department continues to take action to improve teacher supply in classics subjects. Recruitment to classics initial teacher training (ITT) courses is unlimited and trainee teachers of classics will receive a bursary of £26,000 in 2018-19 if they have a 1st, 2:1, 2:2, PhD or Masters.

The £4.8 million Modern Foreign Languages Pedagogy Pilot commenced in December 2018. It is managed by the newly appointed Centre for Excellence and is run through nine school-led hubs to improve uptake and attainment in languages at Key Stages 3 and 4. The Department has also launched a pilot project in languages undergraduate mentoring for secondary school pupils to drive participation in the subject, specifically targeting areas of high disadvantage to extend access to languages for all pupils.