A High School in Canada Will Start Teaching a Course on Filipino Language and Culture

For the first time ever, a high school in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada will offer a course on Filipino language and culture. 

A report on DailyHive said students in grade 10 to 12 at the Tupper Secondary School in East Vancouver will be able to take the course as an elective starting in the 2023-2024 school year. Although not a language credit course, it will teach students the standardized version of Tagalog.

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“[The course] is intended to introduce students to the Filipino language at the beginner level, while exploring Filipino history, traditions and culture,” a spokesperson from the Vancouver School Board, which approved the class this week, told DailyHive.

The news platform notes that this is the first time that a Filipino language course is being offered in British Columbia although not the first time that language other than French is being offered as a second-language course in schools.

Language courses approved by the BC Ministry of Education include Italian, German, Spanish, Japanese, Korean, Punjabi, Mandarin, and American Sign Language.

An estimated 159,000 Filipinos live in the Greater Vancouver area, making them the second-largest ethnic minority group in Vancouver and third largest Asian-Canadian minority group overall behind Chinese and South Asians.