English continues to be offered as an extracurricular activity (AEC) in 97% of public primary schools in Portugal despite not being considered a compulsory subject, according to the office of the Ministry of Education and Science (MEC).
In July, a document signed by Education Minister Nuno Crato offered schools the chance to make English a curricular subject in primary education, as long as they had the teachers to do so. However, the same document read that it was no longer mandatory in the AEC programme.
Now, opposition parties and parent associations are accusing Crato of creating unequal access to English lessons and contradicting his proposed law in July, especially after having defended the need to make English mandatory up until the ninth grade earlier this week (see ‘Confusion over English class’ in last week’s edition of the Algarve Resident).
Despite English lessons not being compulsory, data from the 2012/2013 school year revealed that 91% of primary school students attended the classes nonetheless.
The Directorate-General of School Establishments conducted a survey on its website to gather the data, but the MEC has revealed that it is now carrying out a more in-depth study.
