IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v12y2020i6p2461-d335101.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Technology University Students’ Attitudes towards the English Graduation Benchmark (EGB): A Comparison between English-major and non-English Major Students

Author

Listed:
  • Hsuan-Yau (Tony) Lai

    (Department of Applied Foreign Languages, College of Management, National Taipei University of Business, Taipei City 100, Taiwan)

  • Jih-Fu Tu

    (Department of Industrial Management and Business Administration, College of Business and Management, St. John’s University, New Taipei City 251, Taiwan)

Abstract

The English Graduation Benchmark (EGB) is a common criterion adopted by many universities in Taiwan, including both comprehensive and technology universities to monitor their graduates’ English ability. However, this common criterion has caused some debates in recent years about its appropriateness and fairness to students from less advantageous backgrounds. Some universities have decided to stop this policy in practice. This study aims to investigate technology university students’ perspectives and attitudes towards the EGB, as well as to compare and contrast the opinions of students from English and non-English departments. A quantitative method was adopted for this study. The questionnaire included: (1) Participants’ background information, (2) their experience of taking the proficiency tests, and (3) their thoughts on the EGB policy. In total, 360 students participated in this study. The results showed that most technology university students agreed with the establishment of the EGB. Students from English and non-English departments had positive attitudes because the benchmark motivated them to learn English in some way. Last but not least, technology university students considered the EGB to be useful for their future career development. This paper considers the possible implications of these findings for universities and the government, and suggests how they might re-conceptualize their policies to make them more sustainable.

Suggested Citation

  • Hsuan-Yau (Tony) Lai & Jih-Fu Tu, 2020. "Technology University Students’ Attitudes towards the English Graduation Benchmark (EGB): A Comparison between English-major and non-English Major Students," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(6), pages 1-13, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:12:y:2020:i:6:p:2461-:d:335101
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/6/2461/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/6/2461/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Wei-Yan Li & Kevin Kau & Yi-Jiun Shiung, 2023. "Pedagogic Exploration Into Adapting Automated Writing Evaluation and Peer Review Integrated Feedback Into Large-Sized University Writing Classes," SAGE Open, , vol. 13(4), pages 21582440231, November.
    2. Qing Xie, 2021. "Using Production-Oriented Approach in Business English Courses: Perceptions of China’s English-Major and Non-English-Major Undergraduates," SAGE Open, , vol. 11(2), pages 21582440211, May.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:12:y:2020:i:6:p:2461-:d:335101. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.