European Union: 60% of lower secondary level pupils studied more than one foreign language in 2014

According to statistics produced by Eurostat, learning a foreign language at school is very common in the European Union (EU). Around 18 million lower secondary school pupils (98.6% of all pupils at this level) studied at least one foreign language in 2014. Nearly 11 million of them (59.9%) were studying two foreign languages or more.

English was by far the most popular language at lower secondary level in 2014. English was studied by more than 17 million pupils (97.3%). French (5 million or 33.7%) came second, followed by German (3 million or 23.1%) and Spanish (2 million or 13.1%).

Here is the link pointing to the full press release issued by Eurostat on Feb. 1st, 2016: http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documents/2995521/7146709/3-01022016-AP-EN.pdf/31595c2c-dbb8-4c95-9ad5-8cb038ffecd3