German consumers have been urged by an influential German comparative product testing foundation to travel to England instead of Malta to learn English as a foreign language. The foundation had sent a team of “secret shoppers” to both Malta and England to survey the quality of English language teaching in both countries.
Among the main findings for Malta were that the quality of English language teaching was poor since most teachers did not use English as their mother tongue, and that the German testers tended to speak better English than their host families.
The end result, according to the foundation, was that students of English as a foreign language “learn English in the mother country better than in Malta”.
The foundation, Stiftung Warentest, is influential in Germany and carries out hundreds of tests on several hundred products each year. Ninety-six per cent of all Germans are familiar with the foundation’s work, while one-third rely on the results of the foundation’s investigations when making important purchasing decisions.
The foundation sent a team of 27 secret testers with advanced English language skills to nine language schools in Malta in different periods after the peak summer season this year.
The testers surveyed a range of services including at least one language course in a language school, on-site accommodation and residing with a host family.
When it came to staying with host families, which the foundation described as an authentic way of experiencing the country and its people, the area was singled out as being especially poor. In some cases the foundation’s testers spoke better English than their hosts, while the poor quality of accommodation and food, the foundation says, “... in some cases exceeded reasonable limits”.
But even in England, the testers found accommodation to be a weak point, with some hosts barely even speaking English.
The overall conclusion, which will undoubtedly be read by thousands of Germans considering language courses in Malta next summer, was that when it came to learning English, England was a far better destination than Malta since English in Malta is “only an official language and not the mother tongue”.
There were also what the foundation described as “large differences” in the materials and books offered by different schools. In terms of excursions offered by schools, a big money-spinner, the testers found they could easily organise the excursions themselves at significantly cheaper prices.
Germany is one of, if not the largest core market for Malta’s teaching English as a foreign language industry, which has been growing steadily over the years.
This summer the Swedish press ran a number of critical articles on Swedish English language students in Malta.
One such article reported that undercover journalists, posing as students, found language students in Malta having sex on the beach and enjoying unlimited access to alcohol and drugs. The cocktail of alcohol and nightlife, it was reported, also meant that female students as young as 14 were allowed into clubs and were prone to being sexually harassed, at times by group leaders.