Blog del Instituto Cervantes de Londres

The director of Instituto Cervantes, Luis García Montero, and the head of the Spanish Department of the University of Aberdeen (Scotland, United Kingdom), Jesse Barker, signed an agreement for academic and cultural cooperation that makes the university an official examination centre for the Spanish Diploma (DELE) administered by Cervantes.

The signed agreement integrates the School of Language, Literature, Music and Visual Culture of the University of Aberdeen into the network of Instituto Cervantes’ examination centres in the United Kingdom. The first exams will be held next May with the support of Instituto Cervantes in Manchester (England), the centre to which the agreement is attached.

With the agreement signed in the third most important city in Scotland, the presence of Instituto Cervantes in the north of Great Britain is being reinforced, with the aim of meeting the growing interest of British students to obtain the DELE diploma and internationally recognised certification of a command of Spanish.

The University of Aberdeen joins three other Scottish educational centers that hold DELE exams: the University of Strathclyde (Glasgow), the Edinburgh College (Sighthill Campus) and SALT Edinburgh: Academy of Language and Translation in Edinburgh. The number of candidates in Scotland increased by 60% in 2019 compared to the previous year, and a similar growth is expected in 2020.

«Spanish Ambassadors»

The presence of Instituto  Cervantes in the north of the United Kingdom, and in Scotland in particular, has been reinforced in recent years. This is attributable to the joint planning of cultural activities with Scottish universities from the centre of Manchester with a focus on history, art, literature and cinema. The Spanish cultural offer includes the launch of the «Luis Buñuel Film Club» at the universities of Aberdeen and Strachclyde (Glasgow) and the «Spanish Ambassadors» programme, aimed at young university students interested in spreading the Spanish language and the Spanish-speaking culture.

García Montero has also met with the heads of the Spanish departments of four other Scottish universities (Edinburgh, Dundee, Strachclyde and Saint Andrews) og which he thanked for their work in promoting Spanish whilst also encouraging them to propose initiatives that increase the Students’ interest in the Hispanic world. The Spanish Consul General in Edinburgh, Ignacio Cartagena Núñez, and the director of the Cervantes Institute in Manchester, Francisco Oda-Ángel, participated.

On the invitation of  the Lawyers Without Borders Students Association of the University of Aberdeen, Luis García Montero also participated in the VI Annual Human Rights Congress, whose central theme revolved around the freedom of artists in the promotion of fundamental rights.