Students’ Perceptions of the Use of English in Higher-Education Bilingual Programs

Maria Sagrario Salaberri-Ramiro; María del Mar Sánchez-Pérez

doi:10.5294/laclil.2021.14.2.4

Authors

Maria Sagrario Salaberri-Ramiro Author Universidad de Almería http://orcid.org/0000-0002-4613-2557
María del Mar Sánchez-Pérez Author Universidad de Almería https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6550-9030

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5294/laclil.2021.14.2.4

Keywords:

Bilingual programs, higher education, students’ voices, English-medium instruction, English language use

Abstract

Students’ voices about the use of the English language in bilingual higher-education programs have received little attention, since most research has focused on lecturers’ attitudes, challenges, and needs. This exploratory study aims to gain insights into the perception of 310 students from a Spanish university context about the use of English in bilingual programs through questionnaires. Results show the students’ overall satisfaction in terms of lecturers English language proficiency and use of strategies to facilitate comprehension, as well as reluctance to be evaluated in that language, demand for further classroom interaction, and inclusion of language-related courses in bilingual-higher education curricula.

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Author Biographies

Maria Sagrario Salaberri-Ramiro, Universidad de Almería

Full Professor at the Department of Philology of the University of Almeria and former Vice-Chancellor of Internationalization at the said university. She is currently the Councillor for Labour, Migration and Social Security of the Spanish Embassy in Ecuador.

María del Mar Sánchez-Pérez, Universidad de Almería

Assistant Professor and Director of International Mobility at the University of Almeria (Spain). She holds a PhD in Applied Linguistics, and her research interests include FL/L2 teaching methodology, ESP/EAP, CLIL, ICLHE, EMI and Internationalization in Higher Education. She is currently the Secretary of ICLHE Spain Regional Group and the Lead Coordinator of the Spanish regional team of the Teaching English & Teaching IN English in Global Contexts (EMI research group) network.

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