Pupils across East Renfrewshire will be getting a helping hand with their language lessons, thanks to the arrival of teaching assistants from Germany, France, and Spain. A number of foreign students will spend the next year helping youngsters in the Barrhead area get to grips with another language. The project is being supported by the British Council, which is the UK’s international organization for educational opportunities and cultural relations.

In 2016, for the first time, the EU adopted a “Strategy for international cultural relations” that focuses on advancing cultural cooperation with partner countries across three main strands: supporting culture and education as engines for sustainable social and economic development; promoting intercultural dialogue for peaceful inter-community relations; and reinforcing cooperation on cultural heritage.

Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS)  has quietly been trying to change the odds against Syria’s future generations through its educational programs, some which continue in Syria despite the conflict. [...] Through its Mercy in Motion campaign, sign of its commitment to the Jubilee Year of Mercy, JRS has pledged to increase its educational services to reach 100,000 more of the world’s refugees by the year 2020.

China’s state-sponsored cultural exports inevitably create controversy in the West. Critics warn that educational institutions receiving financial support from the Chinese authoritarian regime risk ceding control of their curriculum, academic freedom and intellectual integrity.

"It is more important now than ever for Americans and the peoples of the Middle East and North Africa to share ideas, knowledge, and skills in order to promote collaboration, enhance economic development and prosperity, address global and regional issues such as climate change, and achieve broader understanding between cultures.”