Session R4J

San Juan, PR July 23 – 28, 2006 9th International Conference on Engineering Education

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Certification Of English Language Competencies In Engineering Education

Paulino Alonso1 and Claudia Parra2

1 Paulino Alonso Rivas, Dean of the Faculty of Engineering , Pontifical Catholic University of Valparaiso, Chile. palonso@ucv.cl 2 Claudia Parra Böhringer, Institute of Education, , Pontifical Catholic University of Valparaiso, Chile claudia.parrab@gmail.com

Abstract- The Faculty of Engineering of the Pontifical Catholic University of Valparaiso, has established within its strategic goals, the improvement of the English language learning skills for all its graduate students in a way in which their level of proficiency could be internationally certified and recognized as an additional and distinctive element of their engineering educational program. This intends to favor graduates’ first approach to employability and grant them further professional opportunities in an increasingly globalized working environment, where almost all entry-level engineering jobs require English language skills to facilitate international cooperation and mobility. This paper describes general guidelines for implementing English language courses in the engineering programs at the Pontifical Catholic University of Valparaiso, whose learning outcomes could be accredited by internationally recognized certifications. One implementation of a pretest by an internationally recognized institution to pregraduate students of Industrial Engineer is presented here to illustrate the use of the instruments and the need to determine what level of English learning Outcomes is possible for them to develop, as well as the time needed to assure the best results in achieving international certification . Index Terms - Certification, ESL, international English language exams, English language competencies.

INTRODUCTION AND BACKGROUND

The Ministry of Education in Chile has carried out a process of Accreditation of University Graduate and Postgraduate Programs and of Institutions; within this process, the Pontifical Catholic University of Valparaíso has accredited itself institutionally as well as 42 of its 56 graduate programs, becoming the first University in Chile with such number of programs accredited. Nevertheless, within the Engineering Programs already accredited, English language learning has been highlighted as the weak element of the formative process. This is due to Chile’s interest in developing a more active international relationship within the framework of the considerable number of Free Trade Agreements that Chile has signed with Europe, the United States of America and, more recently, with China.

Even though the different Schools of Engineers within the Faculty have longly included complementary English courses for their students, these have not granted a recognized level of language skills that could make easy for different stakeholders to identify their candidates’ real English language competencies. Moreover, Chile’s new international context, has introduced this new challenge of getting the highest quality recognition, by developing Quality Assurance in University Engineering Programs, not only regarding the academic field but also in the developing of certified English language communication skills. Hence the Faculty of Engineering of the PCUV, has decided to seriously devote its efforts to the implementation of an English Program that could lead to the certification of learning outcomes.

ENGLISH LANGUAGE REQUIREMTS FOR

ENGINEERING PROGRAMMES.

Several studies [1] have identified that in undergraduate engineering programmes there is a problem related to the students’ understanding or rather lack of understanding of the English books they are required to read, so the proposal should also consider training undergraduate students to read. Comprehension requires more than grasping individual terms and the context must be understood as well. The development of a reading comprehension programme must of course be based on a systematic study of the comprehension of specialized texts in English language. How much do the students know and understand? How much time do they need to improve their English language comprehension?. How long would it take to certify what level of reading English competence? What about the rest of the skills required to be able to communicate in English? What aspects of the English language cause them problem?

Not only understanding books is considered important for students to be achieved at university level, understanding oral speech, speaking and writing is also a need for any professional who wants to succeed in an increasingly globalised world. Globalisation is creating special needs in the language-learning and teaching areas, a situation which is especially relevant in the case of English which is establishing itself as the major language of communication for people throughout the world. Despite these requirements, Engineering pregraduate students have to follow a heavy and demanding curriculum in its disciplinary contents. Thus any English language programme should be regarded as a complementary

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San Juan, PR July 23 – 28, 2006 9th International Conference on Engineering Education

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and distinctive element of their formal education aiming at improving English language skills specially to those students coming from state schools who have not followed a progressive and systematic English language study. The situation is actually more difficult if we acknowledge the following problems: • The Ministry of Education in Chile has relatively

recently developed initiatives to introduce mass teaching of English throughout the country. It aims to prepare children from preliminary schools towards the Cambridge Esol exam KET (Key English Test) and last year secondary students towards the PET (Preliminary English Test), certifying only elementary and preliminary levels.

• It is estimated that in Chile at least, the government is looking at something like the next 10 years to reach its objectives.

• At the moment, over 90% of the Engineering Faculty students come from state schools without previous English language preparation.

Therefore, the problem, of course is that our Engineering

Faculty cannot, meanwhile, think on requesting a compulsory exit intermediate level certification to students who have not yet acquired at least a certified preliminary one. Further considerations on these matters made the Faculty of Engineering of the Pontifical University of Valparaiso create a committee to study the issue and propose a reasonable and achievable English language programme.

CERTIFIED LEARNING OUTCOMES

The English Language Committee was set up by the Faculty of Engineering to study the different English language approaches and determine the best programme to be implemented within the nine pregraduate Schools of Engineering.

After the Committee compared and analyzed different university programmes regarding English as a second language , their objectives, approaches and methodologies, it realized that each one of them established their own learning outcomes and passing requirements, not withstanding a clear definition of the standards of references required for students to achieve nor the content to be covered during the programmes

How could any English language programme implemented guarantee the students acquisition of useful skills with clearly defined and internationally recognized learning outcomes? How long would it take for engineering students to achieve successful English language competencies? What programme could then be developed on the basis of the real possibilities of students to certify competencies? what level of competencies is possible to certify? Should certification cover all the language skills-reading and listening comprehension and writing and speaking skills- or is it possible to certify them separately?

The first task the Committee devoted to was in developing consensus about the level of English language competencies that the faculty would demand their students to achieve, therefore, it studied the different certificates that could align to the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEF) and the Association of Language Tester in Europe (ALTE) and their Can and Do statements in the existing levels [2] . This information was considered a key aspect of the analysis due to the time-competency relationship that should be considered to develop and achieve the learning outcomes on each level.

The next aspects the Committee wanted to analyze were the benefits resulting from certification. It finally agreed that advantages outweighed disadvantages. Providing students an international English language certificate grants public credibility and quality guarantee on both the language learning programme implemented within the Engineering Faculty and the learning outcomes. Additional considerations about why certification is required were: • It grants recognition to the Faculty’s effort to

transparency and concern for developing a constant curriculum change and improvement.

• It allows employers to identify their candidates’ real English language competencies.

• It constitutes a very visible guarantee, to the whole society, that all the students who obtain a degree in the Faculty are qualified to communicate in an established and internationally recognized level of English.

• It promotes a highly credible and visible image of high quality, due to the scientific validity granted to the methods of evaluation and examination used by certifications.

IDENTIFICATION OF SUITABLE CERTIFICATION

The English Language Committee devoted its efforts to the study of different models of English language international exams that could suit the Faculty’s engineering pregradute students. It explored a variety of international institutions and types of examinations both in USA and Europe. The results of all this information was presented at a Faculty Workshop to the Directors of the nine Engineering Schools entitled: " Certification of the English Linguistic Competencies and its Orientations " This workshop main objective was to exchange information and to discussion different certifications of international recognition, their formative approaches and recognized levels of learning outcomes.

The Director of the Chilean British Institute of Culture in Santiago, Maria Cristiana Brieva, was invited to explain details, in terms of the expected competencies the students will be able to certify after finishing high school according to the agreement signed by the Chilean Ministry of Education, as well as to provide further details about the certifications they offer. The British Institute already administers most of Cambridge ESOL's exams in Chile

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San Juan, PR July 23 – 28, 2006 9th International Conference on Engineering Education

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This workshop aimed at clearly identifying exams that certify levels of learning outcomes from those that only provide a final score used for specific purposes.

The international language institutions and types of examinations considered in the study were the following: ACTFL: [3] American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages; ETS: [4] Educational Testing Services; ALTE: Association Of Language Of Europe Testers; CEF : Common European Framework of Reference for Language; [5] ESOL: English for Speaker of other Language; IELTS: [6] International English Language Testing System.

All these provide English as a Second Language (ESL) exams. What came then was to answer questions about the different exams they provide; like: What's the difference between TOEFL and TOEIC?" "Should engineering students take the FCE?" "Who recognizes IELTS?" What’s differentiates a BEC from your KET, or a CAE from your CELS, here's a brief summary of the most popular ESL exams considered and their applicability to the engineering curricula of the Pontifical Catholic University of Valparaiso.

ESL exams fall broadly into three main categories: General English, Business English and Academic English.

I. General English Exams

Probably the most popular in this category are the Cambridge ESOL exams. Studies show that one and a half million people in 135 countries take Cambridge exams every year. There are five General English exams, sometimes referred to as the "Cambridge Main Suite."

The first two levels are the KET (Key English Test) and the PET (Preliminary English Test). The KET and PET have reading and writing, listening, and speaking components, and are most often used to assess progress or to prepare for the next exam in the series.

The Chilean Ministry of Education recently launched the national English project, previously mentioned above- English Opens Doors - to improve levels of English in Chile . One of the aims of this project is that all state school students reach a level equivalent to KET by the end of primary school during a four-year programme, and a level equivalent to PET by the end of high school, after an additional four-year programme.

Therefore, Universities will have to wait almost a decade before receiving students with a standardized preliminary level and only then pretend to establish an intermediate or higher English language certificate as exit requirement. The Engineering Faculty needs to have this in mind and decide what to do in the meantime when most of its entering students coming from state schools don’t even have an elementary level of English and need to demonstrate some level of language proficiency as future engineer graduates.

Next up from the PET is the FCE (First Certificate in English). The FCE has five sections, reading, writing, use of English, listening and speaking. The following Information is

for either a "Full Paper", “Special Session” or "Panel Session". Every presentation at the conference must have a submission.

Only a few percentage of Chilean students have studied at bilingual private schools, which are members of the Association of British Schools in Chile, and they are the only group who are prepared to take this exam at the end of their studies. English is considered a vital part of their education, in fact it’s a distinctive feature. This intermediate level certificate grants them exemption of English courses at Chilean University programmes and it is widely recognized by employers and educational institutions in Chile and so is very popular with students who want to study or work abroad.

Many international universities and employers, however, prefer the CAE (Certificate in Advanced English), which is the next level up. This exam shows that a student is capable of following a university course in an English speaking country or can function in a range of business contexts.

After the CAE comes the CPE (Certificate of Proficiency in English), the highest level in the series. Students who pass this exam have the ability to function effectively in almost every English speaking context. The CPE is also a typical requirement for non-native speakers who want to train as English teachers.

FCE, CAE and CPE have five grades, A-E, of which A-C are passes and are, certainly too demanding to regard them as possible to be achieved massively within the Engineering Faculty of the Pontifical University of Valparaiso.

II. A Particular General English exam

Cambridge also offers CELS (Certificates in English Language Skills). These are individual exams in each of the four skills (reading, writing, listening, speaking). Students can choose which of the exams they want to take, according to their strengths and requirements.

The Engineering Faculty considered quite feasible to develop a programme oriented towards the requirements of this international CELS test, focusing the attention on the reading comprehension skill as a starting point to academic English, hence demanding the approval of the PRELIMINARY level, is considered a possible requirement to be achieved within a period of three to four semester study programme. A diagnostic test sample towards this certification was then requested by the committee.

III. Business English exams

The TOEIC (Test of English for International Communication), run by the Educational Testing Service (ETS) is a multiple choice exam in two sections, listening and reading, each scored out of 445, giving a total of 990. The assessment measures the ability of non-native English-speaking people to use English in everyday work activities.

Two members of the committee took the TOEIC exam, administered by Seminarium, Chile, in order to know the type of English required , and to evaluate the possibility of applying it to all the students. Finally this option was

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San Juan, PR July 23 – 28, 2006 9th International Conference on Engineering Education

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discarded because it is oriented towards a more technical work rather than business and because it provides a score not a certificate.

Cambridge also has a series of business exams called the BEC (Business English Certificate). BEC comes in three levels, Preliminary , Vantage and Higher. The types of exam task are similar to those in the Cambridge Main Suite, but test language ability in a business context. They are recognized by many employers worldwide, and students take them to demonstrate language skills required for international business. There are two pass grades for BEC, Pass with merit and Pass.

BEC Pre-Test Implementation The Cambridge University sent the committee a BEC Preliminary pre-test that was implemented to 30 students form the Business School who were following a Business English programme and to 30 other students from Civil Industrial Engineering with good command of English, who were invited to asses their level under international standards.

They were the first university students in Chile taking part in a process of evaluation of Business English competencies as part of this action-research project.

The results showed assessment criteria for this qualification were difficult to achieve by the group where only 32% of them got over 64% correct answers in the listening part, 36% of them got over 64% correct scores in the writing part, while 72% got over the same percentage of correct answers in the reading comprehension section.

It was then demonstrated, that students need to improve listening and writing skills and that teaching activities should cover all the test business contents, and use an active methodology to help them get a preliminary level Business English language certificate. Nevertheless, it also demonstrated that the most likely certification to be achieved at a first step, was the reading comprehension one.

Those results were also considered by the Business School of the Pontifical Catholic University of Valparaiso (PUCV), whose English teacher has already made changes to the English language programmes for Business English students, being able to modify content, focusing on those covered by BEC exams, adopting a more learner-centered practice, requiring more feedback from students learning outcomes.

II. Academic English exams

A common question that arouse while doing this study was Why not thinking on the TOEFL exam , run by ETS? [7] TOEFL evaluates language skills in an academic context. It is therefore used primarily as a prerequisite for admission to universities and colleges. During 2005 and 2006, TOEFL is

phasing in a new internet-based test (iBT), which will replace the current computer-based and paper-based exams. The iBT has 4 sections, reading, listening, speaking and writing, each with a score of 30, giving a total score of 120. This is likely to cause some confusion for a while, as most students and universities are used to working with the paper-based total of 677, or the computer-based total of 300.

Cambridge also has an academic exam, the IELTS (International English Language Testing System), which they jointly manage with the British Council and IDP:IELTS Australia. IELTS is recognized by universities and colleges, as well as employers, and professional bodies. The exam has listening, reading, writing and speaking components. For the reading and writing, students can choose between an academic and a general option. IELTS is scored on a scale of 1-9. Still too much requirement for engineering pregraduate students coming from Chilean state schools.. On the other hand the main purpose of the Faculty of Engineering is to favor graduates’ first approach to employability and grant them further professional opportunities in an increasingly globalized working environment, where almost all entry-level engineering jobs require English language skills.

Of these four Business English and Academic exams, only BEC provides a certificate in any or all of the three levels (preliminary, vantage, higher), while the others (TOEIC. TOEFL and IELTS provide scores ) A certificate can be presented together with a curriculum vitae at the moment an engineering graduate is looking for a job, enabling employers to know immediately how much the candidate knows or needs to be trained on to get a higher level.

INTERNATIONAL STANDARDS

Now comes the questions from the committee about how exams in the different categories compare to each other. Fortunately, there is a reference guide to help understand this, called the "Common European Framework of Reference for Languages" (CEF). The CEF divides language learners into six levels, and enables anyone involved in language teaching and testing (learners, teachers, teacher trainers etc.) to compare all the ESL exams according to these levels. It also means that employers and educational institutions can easily compare qualifications and see how they relate to exams they already know. The six levels are: • A1 (Breakthrough), Basic level • A2 (Way stage), Elementary level • B1 (Threshold), Preliminary level • B2 (Vantage), Intermediate level • C1 (Effective Operational Proficiency), Higher

Intermediate level • C2 (Mastery), advanced level.

Table 1 shows a quick comparison of exams at the different levels:

Session R4J

San Juan, PR July 23 – 28, 2006 9th International Conference on Engineering Education

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TABLE I INTERNATIONAL STANDARDS AND LEVEL COMPARISON

ALTE level

CEF level

IELTS exam

BEC & CELS exam

Cam bridge

exam

Pitman ESOL TOEIC TOEFL

Level 5

C2 7.5+ - CPE Advanced 910+ 276+300

Leve 4

C1 6.5 - 7 Higher CAE Higher Inter mediate

701 - 910

236 - 275

Level 3

B2 5 - 6 Vantage

FCE Inter mediate

541 - 700

176 - 235

Level 2

B1 3.5 - 4.5 Preli minary

PET - 381 - 540

126 - 175

Level 1

A2 3 - KET Elementary 246 - 380

96 - 125

Break through level

A1 1-2 - - Basic - -

CERTIFICATION AS EXIT REQUIREMENT

Finding that an intermediate English level certificate, as exit requirement, would be difficult to achieve, in the near future, due to the great number of in coming engineering students who have never had systematic English language studies before, the Engineering Faculty finally agreed to implement a pilot English language programme that could accredit learning outcomes according to the CELS Certification (Certificate of English Language Skills) in a Preliminary level, for the Reading comprehension skill.

As a result of the work carried out over the period of one year, by the English language committee, and acknowledging the real English language level that the vast majority of our present students have, the Engineering Faculty of the PUCV decided to implement, a three semesters English language pilot programme, oriented towards the Preliminary CELS reading comprehension certificate, from the second semetre 2006.

A diagnostic test has already been implemented to the Civil Engineering pregraduate students. Applied on April 5th 2006, the exam aimed at determining student skills and levels on English reading and placement in one of the three semester courses that should be offered to pass exam and achieve certification. A sample of a preliminary reading CELS test was applied to 103 Civil Engineering pregraduate students.

CHART I

PRELIMINARY CELS DIAGNOSTIC EXAM

The results presented in Chart 1 shows that, within the 103 students tested, 29, representing 28% of the group will have to take the very basic course 1 during one semester and then continue taking course 2 and 3 to get the exit required level and certificate. Another 44 students, representing 42% of the group, will have to take courses 2 and 3; the other 25 students, accounting for the 24% of all the students assessed, will have to take course 3 during one semester before being ready for certification. Only a remaining 5 students, accounting for the 5% of the Civil Engineering group passed the sample preliminary reading CELS test showing correspondence to the fact that just a few percentage of students have already had English language studies at school. At the moment, no further English courses are considered for this group.

CONCLUSION

As the vast majority of our students comes from state schools where English language learning had not been considered an important aspect of their school education until recently, implementing a certification of English language competencies makes it a complex issue to address. Improvement of the English language learning skills to all its graduate students is now part of the Engineering Faculty’s strategic goals. At the same time, the research held by the Committee, to understand what is internationally understood by certified English competencies, together with the different levels to be achieved for a variety of purposes, have increased the Faculty awareness of the what students should accomplish in terms of certifications and the gap that should be shortened to achieve proficiency.

Implementing both BEC and CELS preliminary pretest of Cambridge University to our pregraduate students, facilitated the Faculty decision to implement the CELS Preliminary English language programme and allowed us to determine the number of courses required to complete a preliminary level programme. This level may be the starting point of a more ambitious programme that will focus on a higher level English language certification feasible to be accomplished once the Engineering Faculty of the PUCV demonstrates that preliminary certification of English language competencies is possible to achieve in Engineering education.

REFERENCES

[1] Polselly Sweet A, E. Snow C. “Rethinking Reading Comprehension”, The Guilford Press, New York,2003

[2] ALTE- http://www.alte.org/can_do/index.cfm

[3] ACTFL- http://www.actfl.org/

[4] ETS- http://www.ets..org/

[5] CEF-ESOL http://www.cambridgeesol.org/exams/cef.htm

[6] IELTS http://www.ielts.org/

[7] j. Gear. R. Gear ·”Cambridge Preparation for the Toefl”, Cambridge University Press, 2002

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