Abstract
The paper aims to explore sustainability from both the external and internal perspectives underpinning the implementation of the empirical study within an English for Academic Purposes course at a Master level in the COVID-19 pandemic. The research is based on the methodology of the development of the system of the external and internal perspectives. The exploratory type of the case study was employed. The interpretive paradigm was used in the research. The observation was conducted on the 23rd August 2020. The sample was composed of the 10 international students of the Master programme “Information and Electrical Engineering” at Hochschule Wismar, Germany. The theoretical research defines the external and internal sustainability. The empirical finding is that the COVID-19 pandemic has influenced the organizational aspect of the English for Academic Purposes course (timetable, classroom arrangements, group work organization). Another finding is that the implemented English for Academic Purposes course is partially sustainable and requires its dynamic equilibrium and localized robustness to be adjusted. Implications for higher education aimed at increasing both the external and internal sustainability in education imply the implementation of the combination of evaluation, namely external evaluation, mutual evaluation, and self-evaluation, jointly carried out by all the process participants.
Highlights
The COVID-19 pandemic has tremendously impacted the sustainability of many people life
The summarizing content analysis allows concluding that fostering of both the external and internal sustainability is based on the methodology of the development of the system of the external and internal perspectives. Another finding is that both the external and internal sustainability are ensured via the implementation of the combination of evaluation, namely external evaluation, mutual evaluation, and self-evaluation
The theoretical research results in the definition of the external and internal sustainability. Another finding is that both the external and internal sustainability are ensured via the implementation of the combination of evaluation, namely external evaluation, mutual evaluation, and self-evaluation, jointly carried out by all the process participants
Summary
The COVID-19 pandemic has tremendously impacted the sustainability of many people life. A lot of people had to adjust themselves to the overnight transformations in their working life, family conditions, and social environments including higher education. Higher education has been significantly adapting to the new conditions created by the COVID-19 pandemic. The COVID-19 pandemic was a cause of universities’ lockdown, rapid shift from on-campus education to digital studies, unprecedentedly fast transfer of printed teaching materials to their digital format, etc. Sustainability is characterized by a dynamic equilibrium and localized robustness, applied to the current status of the affair (Antonini, 1999). Sustainability dynamics is influenced by fluid conditions (Antonini, 1999) or, in other words, factors (Ahrens & Zaščerinska, 2014a)
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