ENGLISH FOR SPECIFIC PURPOSES COURSES FOR ENGINEERING SCIENCES, A NECESSARY REQUIREMENT

Abstract

The present paper intends to show the significance of ESP (English for Specific Purposes) courses offered to students at technical universities, namely the Faculty of Civil Engineering, Surveying and Architecture and Faculty of Environmental Protection from the University of Oradea. Second, it also tries to investigate to what extent these ESP courses have been successful in fulfilling the job requirements of the prospective engineers. We are all aware that globalization has a major influence upon every aspect of life, no need to mention how important it is for technical engineers. Competent English communication is essential for huge success and for having a successful career. Students need to understand the importance of general business English and English for Specific Purposes and need to be well motivated and stimulated to learn if they plan to work for an industry. The students need to familiarize themselves with engineering contents if they want to pursue their career as competitive global engineers with long term goals. Considering how important English is it is no wonder we see it taught in schools, institutes, community colleges and universities as a compulsory course. Integrating ESP, notably in engineering fields, should become mandatory. The students that come to the first year college in the Faculty of Civil Engineering, Surveying and Architecture and Faculty of Environmental Protection are 18-19 years of age. After eight years of primary education and higher secondary level they have had eight or even up to twelve years of English. It has been noticed that some students are better language learners than others even though they all are exposed to similar teaching, use the same learning material and have similar opportunities to practice English. However, it’s a known fact that not all learners behave in exactly the same way. There are some students who are very active, get involved while others prefer to remain neutral, in the back of the class or even passive towards learning. There are some students who progress very fast, apparently with little effort, whereas others put a lot of work into learning and they obtain poor results. There are some shy students who do not wish to interact with the teachers or with the other students. There are also students who prefer to learn things by heart while others opt for learning through practice. Therefore, it stands to reason that the existence of learners with different capacities and abilities seems to be a fact well worth researching. Also worth discussing is the introduction of ESP courses for technical students from the first year of study.

Keywords

• ESP, engineering sciences, syllabus plan, language learners, evaluation