The growth of EMI tertiary programs in Spain: novel approaches to developing linguistic competence in instructors

Abstract

As Dearden notes (2015), teaching tertiary programs in English is a growing phenomenon, and the number of universities incorporating these into their program offerings have risen substantially in the last decade. This may be due to the rise of the importance of internationalization (Morell, Alesón, Bell, Escabias, Palazón & Martínez, 2014). Bologna is also often credited for this change (Kirkpatrick, 2016). However, as the case in Italian public universities show, converting whole programs to English as a matter of course may meet with resistance from faculty and students, and perhaps for good reasons. This paper explores the rise in EMI tertiary programs in Spain and from a European context, and presents approaches to develop linguistic competence in instructors. It seeks to understand how this up and coming trend may affect teaching English at this level. How will EMI instructors become more focused on teaching language as well as their content area?

Associating speaker variables with English pronunciation ratings in Spanish tertiary education

“…This paper focuses on the relationship between some characteristics of Spanish university students as predictors of their pronunciation performance in an educational context where the presence of English has been increasing exponentially for the past two decades (Diogo et al, 2019;Fielden Burns et al, 2018;Foskett, 2010;Ramos García, 2013;Ramos García & Pavón Vázquez, 2018). Said variables comprise the different contexts in which the students have been exposed to English as well as their level.…”