Researchers found that 65% of schools in Flanders insist on the use of Dutch in both class and on the playground. In the case of Turkish and Moroccan students in particular, 80% have reported being punished with detention or extra homework for breaking the rule – more often than children who speak French or English, for example. The researchers interviewed 11,000 students in the second year of secondary school, as well as staff and parents.

“One teacher told how students had to put money in a pot when they were caught speaking Turkish or Moroccan,” says Noel Clycq, who coordinated the project in Antwerp. “But children who made racist statements in Dutch also had to pay up. It was said that the effort had to come from both sides. But the signal being sent out is very negative: that speaking Turkish or Moroccan is as bad as making racist statements.”

Sanctions against a student’s mother tongue give the impression that the culture is not valued, said Anneloes Vandenbroucke of the University of Leuven. “The exclusion of the native language increases the gap between life at home and life at school. But students are able to perform just as well if those two worlds overlap, according to our analysis.”

It is important to encourage the use of Dutch in school as much as possible, without resorting to sanctions, according to Mieke Van Hecke, director of the Catholic school network in Flanders. Outside of school, many students aren’t speaking Dutch at all, she says. “For that reason, the school needs to encourage them to speak more Dutch than only what is required in class. All the same, it should not be perceived as a denigration of their culture.”