The Romanian and German ministries of education signed last month a protocol permitting the participation of Romanian children in free optional lessons of Romanian. Romanian language lessons for children are in high demand among the Romanian diaspora, according to Digi 24.
Germany thus joins the other six EU countries where this protocol functions. These are the countries with the biggest Romanian diaspora: Belgium, France, Ireland, Italy, Portugal and Spain.
The Romanian Language, Culture and Civilization (LCCR) project has been functional since 2007 through the Romanian Language Institute (ILR).
It is targeted at Romanian children outside Romania who attend pre-university schools in European countries. The Romanian lessons are offered for free and taught by teachers selected through public contests.
The Romanian Education Ministry aims at solving the budgeting issues to be able to offer Romanian lessons to as many Romanian-diaspora communities as possible. More information on the LCCR program can be found here.
Recently-published data from the Department for the Romanians Abroad show that as many as 9.7 million Romanians live outside Romania, of which 5.6 million are in the diaspora and the rest in the historic communities around Romania (Bessarabia – today’s Republic of Moldova; Northern Bukovina, Transcarpatia and Bugeac in today’s Ukraine; Voivodina and Timoc in Serbia and Bulgaria) and in the Balkans (Aromanians, Macedonian-Romanians, Megleno-Romanians from Albania and Greece).
A G4media study from last year estimated that almost one-quarter of the foreign residents of Italy were Romanians (1.13 million), while in Spain Romanians make up the largest ethnic minority (over 1 million). Romanians have surpassed the number of 1 million residents in Great Britain, while in Germany they are almost 800,000. And these are only the official numbers.
Photo credit: Facebook / Ambasada României în Italia
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