Last year, as part of my ongoing commitment to international languages, I agreed a further funding round for the Global Futures programme. This funding has resulted in centres of excellence where schools work in partnership with universities and partners to improve the teaching and learning of modern foreign languages across our nation. It also provides funding for the regional consortia to enhance their support offers for modern foreign languages with a specific focus on supporting primary schools to deliver MFL. Global Futures funding supports our primary school teachers to take part in the Open University's TEachers Learning to Teach languages—the TELT programme—in primary schools, which offers beginners lessons in French, German, Spanish and Mandarin.

The programme also grants funds to Cardiff University's MFL student-mentoring project, which Suzy has focused on this afternoon. As she says, it places undergraduates from Cardiff, Swansea, Bangor and Aberystwyth universities into local schools in Wales to mentor year 8 and 9 pupils and to support them in their studies and encourage them to consider choosing modern foreign languages at GSCE level. Last year, recognising the need to adapt in how they deliver to schools, they very quickly developed a digital approach to support schools remotely across Wales at this challenging time. The project plays a key role in broadening the horizons and aspirations of learners. Over 115 secondary schools engaged in the project over the last five years, and that meant reaching 10,000 individual pupils. It has received, quite rightly, not just recognition this afternoon in the Chamber, but also as the recipient of the prestigious Threlford Cup in 2017, and has developed an excellent reputation both nationally and internationally. It is a real credit to the team at the respective universities, the student mentors who take part, and also the learners who are engaging in their programme.

And I have to say, having visited the project myself in a high school in Barry, and seen the mentor deliver a lesson, and talked to the children in receipt of that lesson, it goes so much beyond just learning and encouraging people to study for a foreign language. We came across individuals who had never considered a career in teaching, but had enjoyed their time so very much working with young people in schools, they now were looking to undertake PGCEs to become MFL teachers themselves. And for those young people, some of whom had never met anybody that had attended a university, the opportunity to work alongside a graduate and at the end to be able to visit a university themselves—sometimes an institution that they perhaps had driven past or travelled past on a bus, but had never thought, never, ever thought, of crossing the threshold—it gave them a new look and new outlook on what they could achieve and how university could well be a place that they could aspire to attend also. So, the benefits are manifest in many, many, many ways.

Universities, along with our Global Futures partners—who include regional education consortia, Estyn, language institutes, Qualifications Wales and Careers Wales—all provide expertise and support for language teaching and learning in our schools. And through my commitment to the civic mission of our universities, this approach is now also being funded and pursued in other subjects, and Suzy mentioned our physics mentoring project, which is also really, really successful and potentially gives us the opportunity to think about where else we can employ bright, sparky undergraduates studying at our universities to be real role models for students in our high schools.

As we continue to move forward, we will see developments to other areas of the education system designed to support learners. Qualifications for international languages will also change. As members of the Global Futures steering group, Qualifications Wales are engaging directly with the group's expertise as they look to develop language qualifications that meet the needs of our learners, and I think a focus on linguistic ability and the ability to speak a language, I'm sure, is a very important part of that work.

We're also introducing a new framework for school evaluation, improvement and accountability that requires the use of a wider range of information when considering schools' effectiveness. This approach will better capture the progress of all learners and their whole learning experience, as opposed to a narrow range of key stage 4 examination outcomes. Importantly, these new evaluation and improvement arrangements will support and align with the implementation of the Curriculum for Wales, as recommended by the OECD. By doing so, they will help to reduce the attainment gap and support the realisation of the four purposes of our new curriculum.

I am always encouraged by the excellent attainment of our MFL students, which is testament not only to the learners' hard work, but also to the excellent teaching that they have received. We will continue to work in collaboration with our Global Futures partners to support our schools through these difficult times. I want to once again place on record my thanks to all those involved in the delivery of our MFL mentoring project. It's one that, if Members are not familiar with it, as Suzy says, they really should take a look at. Thank you very much. Diolch yn fawr.