Currently, Latvian students learn English as the first foreign language, but with the end of primary school, they start learning the second foreign language. In theory, children can learn French, German, and other languages as a second foreign language, but in practice, Russian is most often taught because schools lack teachers of other languages.
Data from the Ministry of Education and Science (IZM) show that almost half of Latvian schools learn Russian as the second foreign language.
In the school year 2020/2021, 315 of 685 schools taught only Russian as the second foreign language, 320 of 668 schools in the school year 2021/2022 and 282 of 647 schools in the school year 2022/2023.
The government-backed changes require schools to gradually offer one of the official languages of EU or EEA Member States, or a foreign language governed by intergovernmental agreements in the field of education, as a second foreign language for pupils, from the school year 2026/2027. Russian is not among these languages.
in the school year 2027/2028, the acquisition of a second foreign language other than Russian will be implemented in years 5 and 6, in the school year 2028/2029 – in years 5, 6 and 7, in the school year 2029/2030 – in years 5, 6, 7 and 8, and in the school year 2030/2031 in the whole secondary school stage or in years 5-9.
On the other hand, for pupils who, by September 1, 2025, have started learning Russian or another second foreign language other than one of the official languages of the EU or the EEA, schools will have to ensure the acquisition of that foreign language, including the Russian language, by the end of the 9th grade.
