Push, Don’t Pull: One Self-Access Centre’s Struggle for an Identity

Stuart Warrington

doi:10.37237/090207

Abstract

In Japan, there are a number of self-access centres which, through hard work, collaboration and support, have succeeded in establishing unique identities for themselves. However, as encouraging as this is, there are still university-based self-access centres within the country where the opposite is true. In this article, one self-access centre’s struggle to form a unique identity for itself will be examined. Discussion will first focus on understanding the history of the centre and underlying reasons for why this problem persists. Thereafter, attention will be turned to ambitious efforts being made to deal with the issue in light of long-standing limitations imposed by the university’s administration.

Highlights

Creating a successful self-access centre at a Japanese university is something that is far from simple
This appears to be the result of a combination of factors, which may include a lack of proper planning and foresight on the location and management of a self-access centre, inflexible policy, and lack of support and conflicting interests from university administration (Anderson, Reinders, & JonesParry, 2004; Brown, Adamson, & Fujimoto-Adamson, 2011; Mynard, 2012)
This appears to be the case for the self-access centre at Nagoya University of Commerce & Business where I currently teach and serve as the head of the self-access committee in the Department of English

Summary

Introduction

Creating a successful self-access centre at a Japanese university is something that is far from simple. Its creation was a direct response to what was, at that time, a growing trend in developing institutional self-access centres for language learning in Japan as a way to attract and recruit the depreciating number of high school students in an increasingly competitive higher education market (Monk & Ozawa, 2005).

Results

Conclusion