The third part of that series is out: World Speaks Our Language and Attends Our Colleges
For two years, the Pew Research Center for People and the Press polled 66,000 people from 44 countries on whether children "need to learn English to succeed in the world today."
The answer was a resounding "yes."
More than 95 percent of those surveyed in Indonesia, Germany and South Africa agreed that English is necessary for children. More than 90 percent of those surveyed in China, Japan, France and Ukraine agreed.
Only one of the 44 countries had a substantial minority that disagreed — 35 percent of Jordanians said English is not a necessity.
And that attitude will make all the difference for the future of the Middle East.
Posted by Sarah at December 30, 2004 09:21 AMWe recently went to a small village that is all Sunni and had strong links to the Hussein regime. Several former Ba'ath party big shots live in the town. In a recent trip to their local school, some teachers asked us for English language books. The teachers don't know English so there is no English curriculum at the moment but they hope to have one some day. They'd like to start preparing now. That's how important it is to them. Amazing.
Posted by: Blue 6 at December 30, 2004 09:38 AM