UK authorities have officially apologized to Ukrainian refugee children who were pushed or forced at English schools to choose Russian for their GCSE exam. The reason was the impossibility of taking such an exam in Ukrainian. The Guardian reports.
Schools Minister Georgia Gould said: “Very many pupils were effectively forced into choosing Russian. I am sincerely sorry that they found themselves in this position. It is crucial that they now have access to a GCSE in Ukrainian.”
The issue concerned more than 30,000 Ukrainian children who arrived in the UK after 2022. Since no GCSE exam in Ukrainian existed in the country, some schools offered Ukrainian pupils Russian as an available alternative. The children themselves called such offers “insulting.”
In 2024, Ukraine’s Ministry of Education and Science sent a letter to British authorities warning that, due to the absence of a Ukrainian GCSE, school staff were pressuring children to take the Russian exam.
Now the UK Department for Education has allocated a £340,000 grant to the AQA exam board to develop a separate GCSE in Ukrainian. The course is planned to be introduced in schools in England from September 2028, with the first exams expected in 2029. It will also be available in Wales and Northern Ireland.
