News

MODERN FOREIGN LANGUAGES DEPARTMENT QUIZ

Competitors in the quiz

Monday 1 February 2010

A number of enthusiastic students of French and Spanish came together in the foyer of the Chandos Road Building on 27 January to participate in a language quiz. The questions varied from easy ones such as "Where does the Tango dance and music come from?" to more difficult questions such as "English material on the web has fallen from 51% in 2000 to 29% in 2009: True or false?" (True!) and "Research suggests the UK is missing out on contracts worth up to £21 billion a year because of the lack of language skills in the workforce: True or false?" (True!).

Participants hailed variously from France, Sweden, Italy, Spain, England, Kazakhstan, China and other places too, and probably spoke in excess of 12 languages between them. There were four international teams competing against each other for first and second prizes. The first prize was a bottle of nice Italian wine and the second prize was a big box of delicious chocolates. The other participants received a little Eiffel Tower key chain as a reminder of the event.

A good time was had by all and the importance of learning a foreign language was discussed with enthusiasm. The University offers degree programmes in French, Spanish, and English as a Foreign Language combined with other subjects, and all students have the opportunity to study a language. Buckingham's next entry point for these programmes is in July so why not visit our Degree finder to see what we can offer you? Foundation English courses are also available, with the next entry point in April 2010.

Report by Cassandra Leegwater and the Web Team
Photo by Philipp Hunger