Multilingual education push

[geovalin]

Yesenia Amaro and Kong Meta

Cambodia plans to expand the number of multilingual pre-schools from 55 to 64 and primary schools from 80 to 108 by the end of 2018, Minister of Education, Youth and Sports Hang Choun Naron announced yesterday in Kratie province. About 1.5 per cent of the Kingdom’s population belongs to indigenous groups who speak 24 different ethnic minority languages.

Multilingual education allows children who don’t speak the national language to learn in their native language and gradually transition into Khmer. It was first introduced in some classrooms in 2003, and about 5,500 students currently benefit from such education. Under the expansion, officials expect to reach 10,000 students by the end of 2018, with the number of trained teachers doubling to 300 during that time period.

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