Pupils in England, Wales and Northern Ireland will be able to study Ukrainian at GCSE from September 2028, with the first exams taking place in summer 2029. The Department for Education announced the new qualification on Tuesday 4 November, saying it would help young Ukrainians preserve a connection to their language, culture and identity.

How it will work

The qualification will be developed by exam board AQA, with the Department for Education giving AQA £340,000 to design it. Like other modern foreign language GCSEs, it will assess listening, speaking, reading and writing, and will be open to all pupils, not only those displaced by the war. It will need Ofqual approval before teaching begins.

The apology

Schools minister Georgia Gould apologised to Ukrainian refugee children who had been pushed into studying Russian because no Ukrainian qualification existed. "So many students were pushed into having to do Russian. I'm really sorry that they were put in that position," she said. Ukraine's education ministry had raised the issue in a 2024 letter, warning that children were being pressured to take Russian GCSE.

Why now

Education Secretary Lucy Powell said Ukrainians and their children living in the UK "should have every opportunity to maintain that connection to their heritage and to be proud of who they are". Ukraine's education minister, Andrii Butenko, called it "an important milestone... long called for by the Ukrainian community in the UK". The GCSE forms part of the UK-Ukraine 100 Year Partnership, and follows the government's announcement of a further £10 billion of economic and military support for Ukraine.