ELI Outreach

Photo: UH Relations

The ELI's main role in the university is to provide general instruction in English for Academic Purposes (EAP) to a range of UHM students who have English as a second language (primarily international students, but a growing number of immigrants and other student populations, as well). However, besides offering classes to help students who have English as a second language, the ELI serves the university, the local community, and the national and international community in a number of ways.

Whenever there are distinct, identifiable, and homogenous groups of ELI students, we stand ready to modify existing curriculum, or develop entirely new courses, as part of our support mission to both faculty and students. Indeed, in terms of UHM policy and the instructional needs of UH faculty, it is a requirement that students who do not meet established academic English criteria at the time of admission get assistance from the ELI. Thus, faculty who expect to be working with groups consisting largely of international or immigrant students may find that the ELI's assistance actually lightens their instructional tasks.

 

In Fall 2001, the ELI began developing online sections of its courses, in response to the university's interest in developing online degree programs. Online sections allow UHM students on outer islands, on the mainland U.S., and across the world an alternative means of meeting UHM's ELI requirements, without having to be physically present on campus.

We quickly found that these courses were quite popular, not just with distance-learning students, but also with on-campus students who faced scheduling problems, or otherwise would benefit from taking one or more of our ELI courses in online format.

 

Presently the ELI is supporting the delivery of the College of Business Administration's Vietnam Executive MBA (VEMBA) program, an on-site program taught at the Hanoi School of Business in Vietnam National University, Hanoi. In connection with the VEMBA program, we are modifying existing courses to reflect an English for Business Purposes (EBP) perspective. This calls for a needs analysis and curriculum development, some of which will be done on-site in Hanoi, and some of which involves the cooperation with faculty from the College of Business Administration.

The first ELI/EBP course for VEMBA students will be offerred in Hanoi during Summer 2004, with a follow-up online course in Fall. We expect to continue with similar offerings to subsequent cohorts of the VEMBA program.

 

The needs analysis and curriculum development being done for the VEMBA program will also serve as a baseline for EBP courses for additional programs that the College of Business Administration is currently exploring.

 

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