ESP administration and ESP teacher training

Abstract

A good knowledge of course design, methodology and materials production will not turn an ESP teacher into a future administrator. Since many students on master's courses will probably look for posts with administrative responsibility, the Diploma/MSc course in Teaching English for Specific Purposes at the University of Aston in Birmingham has offered a special optional course called “ESP Administration”. This paper discusses the case study approach used in the course. The details of the case are in two parts: Background Papers, describing the (imaginary) country and Polytechnic ESP Unit; and Action Papers, being three letters from outside bodies requesting the unit to provide new courses. The scarcity of published articles (a review is included) was one factor which encouraged the case- study approach. Another reason for using a case study is that it demands responses at many different levels.

The option has been tried out as both an extensive and an intensive course. Reactions have been extremely diverse, but all groups have tended to concentrate more on course design, timetabling, or the “unionization position” than on other aspects of administration such as good customer relations. The case study can develop in many directions but the character of each realisation depends on the interaction between the participants. One of the unresolved questions is how and at what point to offer explicit teaching on administrative problems to consolidate the undoubted learning that takes place through the case-study experience.