Preserving plurilingualism: A case study of emerging language policy in a small polytechnic institute in Portugal
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María del Carmen Arau Ribeiro is a cofounder and currently Executive President of the Association of Language Centres in Higher Education in Portugal (ReCLes.pt). She has also been President of the Portuguese Association for Teachers of Foreign Languages in Higher Education since 2004. Her teaching responsibilities include General English classes as well as English for specific purposes of Management & Marketing/Health/Tourism and Linguistics. Her research focuses on learner empowerment through awareness of strategies and styles and metacognitive development for language learning.
Abstract
Some policy is first created then implemented. Other policy has a way of making itself known through the back door. This article describes the implementation of a slowly emerging language policy at the Polytechnic Institute of Guarda, Portugal, starting before the Bologna Process led to curricular reform and a restructured social balance in higher education, and leading up to current practice. This account includes early grass-roots movements clamoring for institutional language support and English classes voluntarily taught over several years in varying modalities, curricular and extra-curricular, and other English classes for faculty, students, and campus staff, among other variations on a theme. The administrative perspective is considered along with teaching and learning perspectives on the resulting academic support initiatives. The theoretical basis takes account of EU directives as well as guidelines from the Council of Europe and concepts related to the “learning society”.
About the author
María del Carmen Arau Ribeiro is a cofounder and currently Executive President of the Association of Language Centres in Higher Education in Portugal (ReCLes.pt). She has also been President of the Portuguese Association for Teachers of Foreign Languages in Higher Education since 2004. Her teaching responsibilities include General English classes as well as English for specific purposes of Management & Marketing/Health/Tourism and Linguistics. Her research focuses on learner empowerment through awareness of strategies and styles and metacognitive development for language learning.
©[2013] by Walter de Gruyter Berlin Boston
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Articles in the same Issue
- Masthead
- Anwendungsorientierte Forschung in und für Fremdsprachenzentren: Eine neue (?) Herausforderung
- Analyzing student teachers' academic literacy needs: A qualitative analysis of Flemish first-year teacher trainees' needs
- “As you sow so shall you reap” – but what to sow? The Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) applied to a Flemish business context
- Designing tailor-made academic paths for university language students
- Developing communicative competence in university language programmes
- Advanced learners of German as a foreign language in an academic context: Some didactic implications of their needs and motivations
- Learning in a language centre: A new kind of “do-it-yourself”?
- The impact of language policy issues on program development and management at the University of Zurich and ETH Zurich Language Center
- Plurilingualism, multilingualism and internationalisation in the European Higher Education Area: Challenges and perspectives at a Swiss University
- The linguistic landscape of international students in English-medium Master's programmes at the University of Helsinki: Student perceptions on the use of English and plurilingualism
- Engaging L2 undergraduates in relevant project work and interaction: A role for video conferencing
- Language education at the University of Aveiro before and after Bologna: Practices and discourses
- Sprachenpolitik und ihre Umsetzung am Beispiel des Mobilitätsprogramms Erasmus Mundus
- Preserving plurilingualism: A case study of emerging language policy in a small polytechnic institute in Portugal
