The Baltic Course: English is the most studied language in EU schools - by Danuta Pavilenene

For the complete report from The Baltic Course click on this link

English is the most studied language in EU schools - by Danuta Pavilenene

English is the most studied language in schools in the European Union, but over 35% of adults only speak their mother tongue, fresh data released by Eurostat shows.

English is also the most commonly spoken foreign language among adults aged 25 to 64 years, except for Bulgaria, the Baltic States and Poland, where Russian predominates. While English may be the de facto EU lingua franca, in Great Britain, half of the pupils are learning no foreign languages at all, while in Ireland, one in five school children are not taking classes in overseas tongues. Among the pupils who do study foreign languages in these two countries, French is the most common choice. In contrast, all students in upper secondary education in the Czech Republic, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and Finland study two foreign languages, followed closely by Slovenia and Slovakia (98%) and Estonia (97%).