Abstract
Along with the growing practice of teaching English for Specific Purposes (ESP) in non-English departments of tertiary education, it is essential to investigate the challenges faced by ESP teachers. It can be a basis for proposing policies for the improvement of ESP practice. This study was driven by the fact that ESP classes in non-English departments are allocated limited credit hours, and the teachers are generally General English teachers with no experience and training in teaching ESP. Thus, this study attempted to investigate the fundamental challenges faced by ESP teachers in one state and four private higher education institutions. The data of this qualitative study were obtained through interviews with five ESP teachers. The interview questions were mainly concerned with the knowledgeability and competence in teaching related to subject-specific contexts, adequacy of ESP training, needs analysis, and classroom condition. The findings reveal that the evident challenges encountered by ESP teachers were: lacking knowledge on students’ field of study, lacking of ESP training, lacking of proper needs analysis, large classes, and various learners’ English competencies. The findings of this study suggest that policymakers (stakeholders) should pay more attention to the practice of ESP teaching, especially in non-English departments, by reforming policy in order to minimize the problems faced by ESP teachers and to improve the practice of ESP teaching.
Highlights
In the past few decades, the demand for teaching English for Specific Purposes, or ESP, in higher education has been increasing
Previous studies have brought findings that indicate various challenges faced by ESP teachers, and they are mostly related to the design of ESP courses and materials
This study reveals several findings contributing to the challenges encountered by ESP teachers in some non-English departments of colleges
Summary
In the past few decades, the demand for teaching English for Specific Purposes, or ESP, in higher education has been increasing. While in Poedjiastutie’s (2017) study, both teachers’ and students’ readiness in ESP teaching and learning emerged as a tough challenge Both studies present weak evidence due to their limited research contexts. While Marwan’s (2017) qualitative study involved only a single research participant in a particular university, Poedjiastutie’s (2017) research findings were generated from data gathered from numerous research participants in a single university Both studies cannot represent the general condition concerning challenges faced by ESP teachers in higher education within the Indonesian context. None of these studies display recent convincing evidence pertaining to the challenges of teaching ESP in various nonEnglish departments of tertiary education. The research question of this study is: What are the actual challenges faced by ESP teachers in higher educational institutions? The findings of this study can be used to urge policymakers and stakeholders of ESP in the non-English departments of higher educational institutions to give more serious attention to ESP practice as well as to improve it
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