The next item on the Indian Leaders Programme agenda was an institutional visit to the Instituto Cervantes headquarters in Madrid, at the building which was originally home to Banco Español del Río de la Plata. The delegation was welcomed by Luis Prados, Head of Cabinet, and Richard Bueno Hudson, Deputy Academic Director.
Prados gave an overview of the strategy of Instituto Cervantes for India, “where the Spanish language has great potential for growth.” “We are going to implement a new plan of action which will involve cooperating with local institutions, rather than opening large centres,” he said. Universities could be the perfect partner to implement this strategy and Indian business schools have clearly demonstrated their interest in offering programmes that include Spanish, Prados confirmed. Richard Bueno Hudson gave an overview of the history of the institution, its education system and its global online presence.
The Indian Leaders showed great interest in issues related to the promotion of the Spanish language in India through Instituto Cervantes, such as the possibility of welcoming native teachers to Indian institutions, promoting Spanish through extracurricular activities and the differences between the language’s different varieties.
They all pointed at Spanish as a highly demanded language in India, and Instituto Cervantes works actively towards promoting this language and culture abroad. Instituto Cervantes opened a centre in Delhi in 2009 to meet this growing demand.
Since then, the Delhi centre has been among the five largest in the Cervantes network by number of students and DELE examinations, and boasts a student growth rate of almost 20%. Instituto Cervantes has standing agreements with Goa, Kerala and Maharashtra to teach Spanish in these states. It also has agreements with centres in 7 cities (Bangalore, Kolkata, Chennai, Delhi, Pune and Mumbai) to carry out DELE examinations.
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III Edition Activity summary
