The Ministry of Culture and Tourism has resumed with force the return in person to the international market of Spanish for foreigners, developing actions in Italy, the United Kingdom, Germany, Sweden and Finland.
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October 2, 2021
Castile and Leon | Ministry of Culture and Tourism
Castilla y León remains the main reference in Spain in terms of learning Spanish for foreigners, ahead of the rest of the Autonomous Communities in face-to-face promotion, through the Commissioner of the Spanish Language, in collaboration with the respective embassies of the main markets of origin. After a year and a half of suspension of face-to-face promotion actions due to the pandemic, the Junta de Castilla y León has organized during this fall, various promotional actions of the language as a tourist, cultural and economic resource, through the teaching of Spanish to foreign.
Thus, in the month of September a first promotional action was held in person in the Italian city of Milan, which has been enormously successful, with the assistance of four Spanish schools in Salamanca, Soria and Valladolid, in addition to the University of Burgos. One hundred Italian Spanish teachers enrolled in the event, covering the entire capacity allowed by the venue due to COVID restrictions.
This weekend the Ministry of Culture and Tourism is going to one of the main international markets in the Spanish sector, such as the British market, in order to personally reinforce the leadership of Castilla y León in this area. The importance of this action is endorsed with the presence in London of the Director General of Cultural Policies and Commissioner for Language, José Ramón González, who will inaugurate these Conference, together with the Minister of Education of the Embassy of Spain in the United Kingdom and Ireland, José Antonio Benedicto. The recovery of face-to-face actions of the Spanish sector in the British market has been valued very positively from the Anglo-Saxon country, which has also confirmed the institutional presence at the inauguration, through Baroness Coussins as a member of the House of Lords.
Development of the day
The Conference takes place today at the Vicente Cañada Blanch Spanish Institute, in London where, after the official opening, various workshops and lectures will be held by different Spanish schools and universities in Castilla y León, aimed at Spanish teachers at the United Kingdom. The organization of this promotional action has been carried out by the Board through the Commissioner for the Spanish Language, in collaboration with the Embassy of Spain in the United Kingdom and Ireland, through its Ministry of Education. In addition to the representation of the sector through the participation of different Spanish schools and universities in Castilla y León, at an institutional level the presence of the Valladolid City Council is also planned, which will have an exhibiting table to promote the city as a tourist destination, cultural and idiomatic.
The Board thus intends to intensely and prominently resume the promotional activity in person in the field of learning Spanish for foreigners, therefore, in addition to these actions, they are planned during the fall, until the last weekend of November, a total of eight stocks with a prominent presence in other international markets of interest such as Germany, Sweden or Finland.
Mixed face-to-face and online promotion strategy
In addition, the Commissioner for the Spanish Language has set the objective of complementing the face-to-face activity with the online promotion that has given very good results during the pandemic, as shown by the following data: from July 2, 2020, the day that all online activity began, 146 broadcasts have been carried out, of which 122 have been live, 153,000 impressions and 96,300 views have been reached. The total number of hours viewed is 54,700 and the YouTube channel ‘Español para todos’ created by the Junta de Castilla y León through which all this activity is broadcast online, already has 3,730 subscribers.
71.9% of the visualizations have been made by women and the most representative age groups are between 35 and 44 years old, with 41.6% representation, followed by those between 45 and 54 years old, with 33 ,4%.
Therefore, the Commissioner for the Spanish Language has proposed to continue taking advantage of the potential of online promotion, making it compatible with the recently launched face-to-face promotion. To do this, during this fall telematic conferences will be held with France, Australia, New Zealand, the Philippines, Thailand, Singapore and India, among others, which will have as a final touch the organization of the I International Congress of Spanish for Specific Purposes, organized by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, with the collaboration, for the first time, of the four public universities of Castilla y León and that will take place from 2 to 5 November.
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