engleski

Exploring the unexplored territory of English- medium instruction in the local context of higher education in Croatia

One of the fundamental components of internalization of higher education is a provision of English-medium instruction (EMI). This requirement is especially prominent in small language communities which need to make substantial efforts in making their institutions internationally visible, in terms of both teaching and research. In view of a larger national strategy of internationalisation of higher education, University of Osijek is expected to introduce a language development programme for teachers in EMI in the Croatian context which would focus on adequate English language skills to manage the classroom, lesson content and student assessment (cf. Freeman et al. 2015) where their target performance should be at the C1 or C2 level (cf. CEFR 2001 ; O’Dowd 2015). Against this background, the aim of the present paper is to report on the survey conducted with the teaching staff on the University of Osijek, Croatia. The aim of the study, which is the first of its kind in that university setting, is to explore teachers' attitudes towards the possibilities of EMI implementation on their institutions in order to provide recommendations for programme development. The instrument used is an anonymous online questionnaire in Croatian addressed at university teachers from all constituent institutions of the University and the findings are expected to provide significant implications for prospective EMI implementation in relation to the specifics of the given academic context. Additionally, compared with the results obtained in a congruent research previously conducted at the University of Rijeka (Drljača Margić, Vodopija-Krstanović 2015), the present findings are expected to provide a more comprehensive insight into the position of EMI in Croatia, thus contributing to the strategic implementation of EMI at the national level and possibly add to the development of EMI policy in non-native tertiary contexts worldwide.

English-medium instruction ; tertiary education ; teachers ; attitudes ; Croatia

nije evidentirano