Simie, Tolera;
McKinley, Jim;
(2024)
English medium instruction in Ethiopian university mission statements and language policies.
Language Policy
10.1007/s10993-024-09693-8.
(In press).
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Abstract
Ethiopia, with no colonial language legacy, adopted English medium instruction (EMI) policy with the establishment of its frst higher education institution, University College of Addis Ababa, over seven decades ago. Over the last two decades, the country has signifcantly expanded its higher education institutions (HEIs) to increase skilled human capital that contributes to economic growth and alleviating poverty. The expansion of HEIs has inevitably increased English taught programmes, which means universities must teach entirely through English presenting myriad issues as most students, especially in rural Ethiopia, have limited English profciency. This study aims to explore higher education policy statements and how these policy statements were interpreted in public universities’ mission statements. The study further examines language support policy for efective implementation of EMI policy. Data gathered from publicly available Ministry of Education and universities’ ofcial websites were analysed using qualitative content analysis. In our analysis we identifed two language-relevant key concerns: English language support and internationalisation. The study uncovered a gap in the statements concerning provision of English language support, despite research evidence and government acknowledgement of students’ and teachers’ weaknesses in the language of instruction. The fndings of this study call for Ethiopian universities to focus more on improving provision of targeted language support for students experiencing language-related challenges, and for policymakers to rethink monolingual EMI policy, to raise the quality of education in such contexts.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | English medium instruction in Ethiopian university mission statements and language policies |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1007/s10993-024-09693-8 |
| Publisher version: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10993-024-09693-8 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. |
| Keywords: | Higher education policy; Language policy; English medium instruction; Language support; Mission and vision statements; Ethiopian universities; English language profciency |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education > UCL Institute of Education UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education > UCL Institute of Education > IOE - Culture, Communication and Media |
| URI: | https://discovery-pp.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10188319 |
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