A majority of Indian students show an appetite for learning additional languages: Brainly Survey

The survey points towards the need for superior language inclusion in education
to create a truly globalized ecosystem

Mumbai, December 16, 2020: Brainly, the world’s largest online learning platform, surveyed its Indian user base to find out the most prevalent and preferred languages amongst students. The survey, called ‘Popular foreign languages considered by Indian students‘, registered 3,206 responses and gave in-depth insights into the increasing demand for native and non-native languages.

86% of Brainly respondents belonged to an English-medium school while only 8.5% had Hindi as their medium of learning. The remaining 5.5% learned in other languages including vernaculars. Moreover, 53.7% of Brainly users had English as their secondary language at school, 35.3% had Hindi, and 11% of users had vernaculars. In terms of foreign languages, French was taught in 24.8% of schools, followed by German (10.7%), Spanish (8.1%), and Mandarin (4.1%). Approx. three-fourth of schools, at 72.4%, also taught international languages other than these.

The survey further revealed that choosing a tertiary language was mandatory in 55.5% of schools, of which regional languages were imperative across 46.7% of schools. However, there was no such compulsion in the rest 44.5% of schools. Almost a quarter of schools (25.9%) have mandated choosing a foreign language.

The findings suggest the inclination of Brainly users towards learning an additional language. Given an alternative, a majority of students would like to either learn a foreign language (36.2%) or a regional one (35.4%) as their tertiary language in schools. 28.4% would not like to pursue any tertiary language. In terms of demand, French, Spanish, German, Mandarin, and other languages (including regional and foreign languages) constitute 32.1%, 11.7%, 10.9%, 5.6%, and 39.7% respectively.

Speaking on the survey findings, Rajesh Bysani, Chief Product Officer, Brainly said, “Today, English and Hindi have largely been standardized as the medium of learning across India. However, there is also a visible demand for other languages throughout the country. I believe we should not neglect any of the demographics if we want to build a truly conducive learning environment. Since they can drive superior personalization, new-age learning platforms today bear the onus to customize their offerings and cater to these evolving groups. It will go a long way in democratizing education.”

To address the challenge of language inclusivity, Brainly, the number one homework help platform, offers content in Indian regional languages. Its QnA model helps resolve academic queries from other international languages as well. The platform has recently seen a massive surge in user base. It now caters to over 350 million users worldwide, including over 55 million users from India.