BBC premiered its new Pidgin service on Monday, August 21, hopeful that the station will attract the estimated 75 million Pidgin speakers in Nigeria, as well as Pidgin speakers in Cameroon, Ghana and Sierra Leone. Pidgin, for the unfamiliar, is a hybrid language that mixes English with one or more other languages. About 5 million Nigerians speak Pidgin as their first language.

Out of this era came three key programs tasked with training a new generation of American students to begin to repair relationships with the peacefully-growing Muslim world, and ameliorate the severe lack of US linguistic capability plaguing both the government and global economic competitiveness. The first, Kennedy-Lugar Youth Exchange and Study, or YES Abroad, was created in the wake of 9/11 to dispel myths about both America and the Muslim world. 

Korean has been designated an official foreign language subject for college entrance exam in France, according to the French Embassy in Korea. An embassy official said on Sunday that France's Ministry of Education included Korean among foreign languages for the Baccalaureat ― an academic qualification test that French high school students must pass to graduate and enter university ― late last year.

Kim Byong-woo, superintendent of the North Chungcheong Province Office of Education, said he is strengthening cultural exchange programs for students to become global leaders. "I think it is especially important for students to experience various cultures overseas," Kim told The Korea Times in a recent interview, citing the office's unique program called Ban Ki-moon Global Leadership Overseas Training.