The research reported in this article explores the relationship between Dörnyei's (2005, 2009) Second Language Motivational Self System (L2MSS) and the L2 proficiency level of Saudi learners of English as a foreign language (EFL). Male and female participants (N = 360) responded to a questionnaire relating to the main components of L2MSS, the ideal L2 self, the ought‐to L2 self, and the L2 learning experience, as well as learners’ intended learning efforts. The participants’ L2 proficiency was then measured with an EFL reading and writing test. Descriptive and inferential analyses of the collected data revealed—as expected—that the components of the L2MSS were a good predictor of the learners’ intended learning efforts. However, the study also established that in this learner population these components were not consistently correlated with L2 achievement. The findings can be treated as evidence that self‐reported motivation does not always have behavioral consequences.

Even though the future is unknown and may be hard to forecast, its formulation can still be influenced by the making of some decisions in the present time (Amara, 1981). This article reviews the TEFL situation in Saudi Arabia in the past and the present, and offers some recommendations for improving it in the future. These recommendations will include policy and school-based levels. The article will include discussions about the Saudi government's strategies of enhancing the education system through Information Communication Technology (ICT), future teaching systems, teachers and students' roles, future teacher education, important issues in assessment as well as recommendations for policy regarding critical issues for EFL instruction in Saudi Arabia, including a detailed examination of the Tatweer Project, which is the Saudi Arabian government policy to be implemented between 2013-2023, with the aim of developing public education in Saudi Arabia.

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Bourdieu’s concept of cultural capital is a potent theoretical device in the analysis of the correlation between familial educational background and individual student performance and outcomes in higher education. The theory of cultural capital enables culture to be conceived as an asset that furnishes its possessors with advantages that can be transferred from parent to child. This paper explores how the possession of cultural capital by students of English as a foreign language at a Saudi university can influence their subsequent learning. Specifically, this study examines how familial education shapes student outcomes in an EFL programme. This relationship has been investigated extensively in different contexts around the world, but not sufficiently within the Saudi context. The findings of the current study are significant as they indicate that Saudi students accrue certain advantages from the educational experiences and resources available to them in their social environments. Furthermore, the study reveals that students with a deficit of cultural capital and no family history of higher education encounter more problems in the EFL programme and demonstrate overall lower levels of language proficiency.