Undergraduate degrees in French and Spanish are being axed from a British university.
The University of Wolverhampton, in the West Midlands region of England, will no longer offer the courses, due to under-recruitment.
The institute declined to provide information about enrolment numbers on the courses, but said that a review had been undertaken, and that they would "expand and diversify short courses for UK and international clients and partners, bespoke courses and consultancy for regional businesses working internationally and preparatory English courses for international students coming to study in Wolverhampton."
Language modules in French, Spanish, Japanese and Russian, among other languages, will still be available, but only as part of degrees in broader subjects, such as teaching English as a foreign language, and English in international business.
The move provoked sharp criticism from linguists. Lucille Cairns, President of the Association of University Professors and Heads of French, described the decision as "retrograde," and wrote to the university to object to the plans.
She said the university should "eschew short-termism," or risk undermining the "urgent and widely recognized need for linguists," according to Times Higher Education (THE, London).
The university's teaching union also objected, saying that by the time it was consulted, an "irretrievable decision" had already been made.
A report by the British Academy in June 2009 warned that the decline in modern language learning put the future of research in the UK at risk, THE noted.
In a separate report last year, the Higher Education Funding Council for England said the lack of qualified language graduates was seriously damaging to government and public policy.
09 May 2010
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