EMI for engineering education in Arab world and twenty first century challenges
Tamtam, Abdalmonem, Gallagher, FionaORCID: 0000-0002-7865-1757, Sumsun, NaherORCID: 0000-0003-2047-5807 and Olabi, Abdul-GhaniORCID: 0000-0001-9209-3619
(2010)
EMI for engineering education in Arab world and twenty first century challenges.
In: 3rd International Symposium for Engineering Education, 1-2 Jul, 2010, Cork, Ireland.
Developments in engineering, as well as modern technologies, are considered the most important requirements for the Twenty-First century in the globalised world. Recent research has shown that there is a significant knowledge gap in the required level of international communication for engineering graduates in the Arab world. This is because the medium of study there is primarily Arabic. To overcome this problem, it has become an urgent necessity to implement English as a medium of study. This paper presents an investigation, which was carried out from the available literature to find possible ways of implementing English Medium Instruction (EMI) in engineering education. This paper also focuses on some non-English speaking countries outside the Arab world, such as the Netherlands, Korea and Indonesia, which have already implemented EMI in engineering education. This study focuses on the problems faced by these non native-English speaking and non-Arabic countries and explores the possibilities of putting into practice the solutions suggested. The paper concludes that in order to improve the engineering education system in Arab countries, it is necessary to implement EMI. Pursuing the internationalisation of the system will achieve a world standard level, not only in engineering but also in communication skills, for engineering graduates
Item Type:
Conference or Workshop Item (Paper)
Event Type:
Conference
Refereed:
Yes
Uncontrolled Keywords:
EMI; engineering education; globalisation; Arab world; bilingual education.