JÈRRIAIS has been added to a secondary school’s curriculum for the first time, in a move described as an “absolute turning point” for the preservation of the language.
Year 7 and 8 students at Victoria College will study the Island’s native language once a week in half-term blocks, with lessons taught by a teacher from L’Office du Jèrriais.
Jèrriais has experienced a dramatic decline in the number of speakers in recent decades, with it classified by UNESCO as critically endangered.
Alongside language learning, the sessions will explore myths, folklore and names from the Island’s history.
Head teacher Dr Gareth Hughes said the school wanted pupils to develop a sense of local identity.
“It’s not just learning abstract concepts in school; it’s about learning a sense of place and identity,” he said. “We’ve really committed. We’ve really leaned into this.”
Dr Hughes said pupils made had already began to make good progress during the first tranche of lessons and that the benefits to pupils extended beyond simply learning the language.
Jèrriais teacher Susan Parker said teaching had previously focused on primary schools and one-off sessions.
“There’s a lot of exposure, but the one-off sessions don’t bring progress in the language,” she said.
“But this can, and then some students really like it and then they can come to the lunch-time club.”
Ms Parker said learning Jèrriais could give children a sense of identity and belonging.
“In this increasingly online virtual world, you want something you can hold on to,” she said.
The Isle of Man offers a possible model for further development. Although Manx is not compulsory, students up to Year 9 must have the option to study it and a qualification is available.
Dr Hughes said he would be “happy to have that conversation” if there was interest in creating a qualification pathway for Jèrriais, while Ms Parker described the Isle of Man, which has a similar population to Jersey, as a “perfect benchmark”, noting that “their revitalisation programme is 50 years down the road”.
She welcomed the progress Jèrriais had made in recent years, saying that “the tide is turning”.
