Summary of Main Findings

professionally and connect with the academic community on campus, and contribute their extensive and highly relevant expertise, they are not always empowered to do so and do not recognise their natural potential for agency.

5.3.1.2 Motivations to internationalise the curriculum. The motivations in this department are characterised by a general sense of urgency and a need to act quickly and respond to an ever-changing, globalised context, where students need more practical

language skills in order to become successful global citizens. Namely, adding components of speaking, listening and writing to the traditional academic reading skills, which were the English for Academic Purposes curriculum focus up until now. These kinds of motivations seem to be inspired by great sense of caring for the home students and a genuine

responsibility to push them forward.

Another strong motivational factor is the need to have a standardised and transparent national English for Academic Purposes curriculum, one which will enable mutual

recognition of English courses across all academic institutions, particularly between colleges and universities. Moreover, should the curriculum be aligned with a world-standard

recognised curriculum framework, such as the CEFR (Common European Framework for teaching and assessment of foreign languages), it will be globally recognised and further serve to support incoming and outgoing student mobility.

A more socially conscious motivational influence on curriculum changes in this case, is the fact that there are significant gaps in the entry-level English students in Israel have when they start their academic education, depending on where they received their primary and high-school education. The academic curriculum is perceived as an opportunity to do

‘social justice’ through internationalisation at home, bridge English language gaps and make sure all graduates have more of an equal opportunity to work in a global context, where English language is a key requirement.

Finally, on a more individual level, English for Academic Purposes teachers feel that curriculum internationalisation is an opportunity for professional development, to discover

‘what’s out there’, find out what others in different institutions and countries are doing and connect to a wider, global community of practice. It is also an opportunity to break away from their relatively isolated position on campus and reconnect with the extended academic community as professionals bearing unique expertise. Curriculum internationalisation can be seen as an opportunity to reclaim their professional status.

5.3.1.3 Interpretations of internationalisation of the curriculum. In line with the driving forces, an internationalised English for Academic Purposes curriculum is primarily interpreted as a curriculum which should play a key supporting role in the academic and professional development of graduates. As such, it should address several dimensions: equip students with functional/practical language skills, empower weaker populations of students, cultivate intercultural awareness through language learning, engage in internationally informed content items and support learning diversity in the classroom. English lessons are depicted by the teachers as a multipurpose learning site where many kinds of learning processes can take place and where students can develop their sense of worldliness in terms of knowledge, behaviour and communication.

5.3.1.4 Classroom Enactment. At the level of the classroom, English for Academic Purposes teachers find themselves preoccupied with addressing both learning and cultural diversities in the classroom. They tend to feel that they must take into account differences in their students’ academic and cultural backgrounds which may affect the way in which the latter approach English language learning. They also tend to prioritise such learning activities higher than following their standard lesson plans. Their altogether heightened sensitivity towards their students expresses an agenda which is in line with

internationalisation of the curriculum. It is important to note however, that their work is more

of an individual grassroots approach rather than a prescribed strategy, and every teacher offers a different kind of application in practice. As a result, they sometimes experience frustration or may feel that the institutional practices or learning arrangements are not in line with their approach. Nevertheless, they do share an understanding that the English lessons naturally lend themselves to learning which is not only language related and offer many opportunities to foster worldliness and global citizenship among their students.

5.3.2 Document analysis of syllabi. Implementation of curriculum

internationalisation in the English for Academic Purposes department is primarily expressed through a change in the academic work culture and processes: moving from delivering a curriculum which was prescribed from ‘above’ towards the inclusion of the academic team in actively shaping their curriculum, engaging in ongoing critical reflection and assuming ownership over it. This is manifested through cultivation of a more collaborative work culture, regular participation in meetings and curriculum workshops, participation in a peer-learning programme, establishment of curriculum development works groups, and a general

‘move out of your seat’ kind of attitude.

A close analysis of the syllabi documents however, reveals that even though a lot of thought and reflection around internationalisation of the curriculum had been expressed both in the space of the in-depth interviews and outside of them, it is not necessarily expressed at the level of the formal curriculum. Most course objectives which were subjected to analysis do not directly communicate a message around internationalisation, and in most cases, internationalised learning outcomes have not been formulated at all. The absence of

internationalised intended learning outcomes stands in contrast to the carefully constructed intended learning outcomes. This may reflect the national or institutional approach towards internationalisation of the curriculum, which finds learning outcomes to be a sufficient form of enactment of internationalisation of the curriculum, without the need to add an

internationalised tier of learning outcomes. Such a systematic absence of internationalised learning outcomes may either reflect a lack of comprehensive strategy towards

internationalisation of the curriculum, or an output set within a relatively narrow

interpretation of the concept. The syllabi documents show a variety of assessment methods and introduce knowledge items which cover a wide range of sources from different locales, offering students many global perspectives on contemporary issues. Taken together, both enactment levels (classroom and syllabi), point to a gap and possibly a tension between the richness of ideas and visions academics have about internationalisation of the curriculum at the stages of motivation and interpretation, and the lack of a more systematic approach towards implementing them.

6 Case 2 – The Freedom to Dare, the Responsibility to Share: Internationalisation