Eduardo González
The Instituto Cervantes has signed an Agreement with the Association in Action and Cooperation for Ukraine (ACU) to collaborate in the teaching and dissemination of Spanish culture and language among Ukrainian refugees.
In accordance with the agreement, signed on April 19 by the director of the Cervantes Institute, Luis Manuel García Montero, and the president of the non-governmental organization ACU, Iryna Zakladnova, and published this past April 30 by the Official State Gazette (BOE), the two entities are committed to cooperating in achieving the objective of integrating refugees of Ukrainian origin and facilitating the learning of Spanish through the two Spanish learning courses that the Institute has hosted on its own pages. Internet: AVE Global de español and ¡Hola, amigos!, in this case for children between six and twelve years old.
The ACU has launched various actions for the reception and integration of refugees from Ukraine, with the aim of facilitating their access to public services and facilitating their integration into the autonomous community of Asturias. These actions contemplate attention measures in the educational field, which includes the use of the aforementioned Spanish language learning courses as a foreign language. The NGO, created in 2022 as a result of the refugee crisis generated by the Russian invasion, operates in Asturias and has the support of the municipalities of Oviedo, Gijón and Avilés, among other entities.
The signing of this agreement does not imply any contribution of economic resources between the parties. Each of the parties will assume the commitments established in this agreement for the year 2024 through their own means, as well as the material and human resources, provided in their respective budgets for the year 2024, in which they have sufficient credit. For the following years in which this agreement is in force, the execution of the commitments assumed will be subject to the budgetary availability of each of the parties.
Two years ago, in May 2022, the Instituto Cervantes signed a similar collaboration agreement with the Spanish Red Cross to facilitate the teaching and dissemination of Spanish culture and language to Ukrainian refugees. That was the first agreement of the institution of Spanish cultural diplomacy to promote support and Spanish teaching programs for Ukrainian refugees as another element for their integration.
Both agreements are part of the single agreement adopted by the Board of Directors of the Instituto Cervantes on March 31, 2022, in which the idea was reaffirmed that “working for culture and education is committing to peace, democratic values, understanding between peoples and that, in the face of any event marked by violence, the response must be supportive,” according to the institution.
