English for Specific Purposes 46 (2017) 15–28

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

English for Specific Purposes

journal homepage: http://ees.elsevier.com/esp/default.asp

“Step Out of the Cycle”: Needs, challenges, and successes

of international undergraduates at a U.S. University
Nigel A. Caplan*, Scott G. Stevens
University of Delaware English Language Institute, 189 W. Main Street, Newark, DE 19711, United States

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: A triangulated, mixed-methods needs analysis was conducted in order to inform the
Available online 27 November 2016 redesign of the English for Academic Purposes program that provides conditional under-
graduate admission to a mid-sized U.S. university. Online surveys were completed by 191
Keywords: students and 226 faculty. Although they largely agreed on the importance of 21 tasks and
Needs analysis activities in undergraduate classes, students rated themselves as significantly more suc-
Conditional admissions
cessful on most of them than did faculty. Qualitative data from open-ended comments and
International students
interviews with five international students provided both insight and complexity to the
Student engagement
Academic literacy
quantitative data. Factors for success (including persistence and engagement) and chal-
lenges for international students (linguistic, cultural, and academic) were identified as well
as a need for greater tolerance from faculty and domestic students and better awareness
and use of support services. Pedagogically, while academic literacy remains vital to uni-
versity success, oral communication skills, especially the ability to engage in discussions
and group work, are equally if not more important for international students.
Ó 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Background

The growth of international undergraduate students, especially from China, in the United States and other Anglophone
countries has received a considerable amount of attention in both the professional and popular press (e.g., Benzie, 2010;
Evans, Anderson, & Eggington, 2015; Ewert, 2011; Hammond, 2009; Stevens, 2012; Wingate, 2015). One article (Bartlett &
Fischer, 2011) focused on the authors’ institution, portraying it for the most part as a good example of a university that
was providing support for the new wave of international students, despite growing pains. Those challenges included push-
back from some faculty unused to teaching international students as well as reports that internationaldespecially Chine-
sedstudents were not integrating in and out of classes.
The University of Delaware (UD) is a medium-sized public university located on the East Coast of the United States.
Although it has been home to an English Language Institute (ELI) for over 30 years, the university has only been offering a
Conditional Admissions Program (CAP) for international students since 2003. Students admitted through CAP are exempt
from submitting standardized English-language proficiency scores and instead meet the university’s language requirement
by passing a sequence of English for Academic Purposes (EAP) courses. Thanks in large part to CAP, the number of inter-
national undergraduates at the university skyrocketed from 153 in 2007 to 860 in 2014, approximately 70% of whom started
their studies at the ELI. While this number still accounts for a small proportion of the undergraduate student body (3.8% in
2016), the increase is noticeable across the campus: faculty who might have occasionally taught international students now

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: nacaplan@udel.edu (N.A. Caplan).

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.esp.2016.11.003
0889-4906/Ó 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
16 N.A. Caplan, S.G. Stevens / English for Specific Purposes 46 (2017) 15–28

Table 1
Grade point averages at the University of Delaware (2013–2014).

Year of Study U.S. domestic Former ELI Directly-admitted

students international students international students
First year 2.93 2.83 2.77
Second year 3.03 2.97 2.89

Note: Maximum GPA is 4.0.

find them in every class. Furthermore, 70% of international undergraduates come from a single country, China (University of
Delaware, 2014).
Bartlett and Fischer’s (2011) article raised important questions about Chinese students’ experiences after they graduate
from the ELI and matriculate as undergraduates. Academically, the signs are positive: Internal data show that their grades
start out a little behind the university average; however, they have almost closed the gap by the end of their second year of
study, more quickly in fact than directly-admitted international students (Table 1). This success cannot solely be explained by
Chinese students’ presumed superiority in quantitative subjects, as Bartlett and Fischer claim, because of the university’s
general education requirements1 and the sheer range of majors where international students are found.
Grades, however, are only part of the picture, representing end-products and not lived experiences. It is important to take a
holistic view that accounts for academic achievement, interpersonal relationships, and cultural integration (Belcher &
Lukkarila, 2011; Mamiseishvili, 2012). Therefore, as part of a review of the institute’s EAP program, a comprehensive needs
analysis was undertaken. This paper reports on the academic needs and strategies for success reported by international
students and their faculty at UD.

2. Literature review

Needs analysis is at heart of the EAP approach (Bocanegra-Valle, 2016; Flowerdew, 2013; Hamp-Lyons, 2001). Existing
needs analyses suggest the types of listening (Powers, 1986), oral communication (Ferris & Tagg, 1996a, 1996b), writing (Hale
et al., 1996; Horowitz, 1986; Leki & Carson, 1997), and multi-skill (Huang, 2010; Johns, 1981; Rosenfeld, Leung, & Oltman,
2001) tasks ESL university students need. However, these findings must be treated with caution for the purposes of pro-
gram design since needs analysis is essentially local and varies over time (Long, 2005).
Unsurprisingly, literacy has been the focus of a substantial number of previous studies of the needs of both L1 and L2
students (Evans, Anderson, & Eggington, 2015; Hale et al., 1996; Leki & Carson, 1997; Leki, 1995; Melzer, 2009; Wardle, 2009),
although others have noted the importance of listening and, to a lesser extent, speaking skills (Ferris & Tagg, 1996a, 1996b;
Johns, 1981). While writing is demanded of undergraduates regardless of the type of university and field of study (Hale
et al., 1996) and the receptive skills of reading and listening are undoubtedly central to academic study (Johns, 1981), there
are other, perhaps determining, factors in international students’ perseverance and success. In a study that is closest in design to
the one described here, Huang (2010) asked 432 ESL students and 93 instructors at a Canadian university to assess their or their
students’ ability to complete 45 different tasks, and speaking emerged as the domain in which students needed the most help.
Beyond the purely academic, though, lies a growing interest in international students’ engagement on U.S. campuses. For
example, in Andrade’s (2006) review of ESL undergraduates’ adjustment factors, social challenges caused greater difficulties than
academic ones. Furthermore, Gareis (2012) estimates that almost 40% of international students do not have a single American
friend. This leads to concerns about isolation and lack of interaction between domestic and international students (Leask & Carroll,
2011). International students themselves rate having friends from both their home and host cultures as a factor that influences
their persistence (Andrade & Evans, 2009). These challenges are not unique to the U.S. context; a nationwide study of international
student engagement in Australian universities linked lower levels of satisfaction with the university experience to significantly
greater attrition rates than their domestic peers (Coates, 2009). Benzie (2010) likewise argues that English proficiency in Australian
universities should not be measured purely in academic success but also in students’ ability to integrate and interact with the
campus community. This is consistent with Tinto’s (1998) theory of resistance and persistence in higher education, summarized
concisely by Andrade and Evans (2009): “Integration must occur both socially and academically. Without some measure of social
and intellectual integration, a student’s chances of continued persistence in higher education dramatically decrease” (p. 28).
Closely related to this need for deeper engagement are differences in cultural schema between international and main-
stream domestic students. As Stevens (2012) has suggested, Chinese studentsdthe largest foreign population on our campus
and in the United States overall (Institute of International Education, 2016)doften arrive with little understanding of U.S.
culture, history, values, and customs, and may try to enact cultural practices that put them in conflict with their professors
and classmates. For instance, based on a small sample, Bodycott (2009) found that Chinese undergraduates and their parents
place little value on extracurricular activities and learning about western culture, focusing instead on academic matters (see
also Andrade & Evans, 2009). However, these same cultural schema are often critical for academic success in understanding
lectures, discussions, and readings (Eggington, 2015; Sullivan, Zhang, & Zheng, 2012).

1
Undergraduate students at this and most U.S. universities are required to take courses outside their major field of study as their “general education” or
“distribution” requirements.
 N.A. Caplan, S.G. Stevens / English for Specific Purposes 46 (2017) 15–28 17

3. Methods

In order to build a three-dimensional picture of the academic, social, and cultural “needs, wants, and lacks” (Flowerdew,
2013, p. 333) of international students at UD, we initiated a mixed-method, triangulated needs analysis (Long, 2005). A
mixed-method paradigm is appropriate since it combines the generalizability of large-scale quantitative survey data with the
explanatory power of qualitative analyses of open-ended comments and student interviews (Onwuegbuzie & Johnson, 2006).
A convergent design was adopted, meaning that the quantitative and qualitative strands were collected and analyzed
concurrently, and interpretations drawn from merging the different results (Creswell & Plano Clark, 2011; Greene, Caracelli, &
Graham, 1989).

3.1. Surveys

Three surveys were designed in order to capture the perspectives of different stakeholders (Bocanegra-Valle, 2016): for
current ELI students (not included in the present study), matriculated international undergraduates (Appendix A), and faculty
(Appendix B). The undergraduate student survey was sent in April, 2013, to all 747 foreign students via an institutional email
list. Responses were received from 128 former ELI students and 63 directly admitted international students for an overall
response rate of 26% (n ¼ 191). The faculty survey was emailed at the same time to all 1172 members of the university faculty
(that is, instructors, professors, and adjunct faculty), 226 of whom (19%) responded, although since not all faculty teach
undergraduate students, the effective response rate is slightly higher.
The surveys collected both quantitative and qualitative data in addition to demographic information. The numerical data
primarily consist of students’ and faculty’s ratings of the importance of and international students’ success on 21 tasks, skills,
or activities that might be expected of undergraduates. The list was based on prior research (e.g., Ferris & Tagg, 1996a, 1996b;
Hale et al., 1996; Huang, 2010; Leki & Carson, 1997; Melzer, 2009), input from ELI colleagues working with matriculated
students, and responses from a pilot survey. Respondents were able to write in additional tasks, few of which fell beyond the
scope of our list (e.g., reviewing notes, self study, data analysis). Students were also asked about the resources they use, and in
open-ended questions, the challenges they have faced and the successes they have experienced at the university. Faculty were
asked about the benefits and challenges of having international students in their classes.2 Thus, the design incorporates both
“target situation analysis” (what students should be able to do) and “present situation analysis” (what they are currently able
to do) in order to inform future programmatic revision (Bocanegra-Valle, 2016).

3.2. Survey respondents

Of the 128 former ELI students, 89% were Chinese, compared to 33% of the 63 directly-admitted students in the survey. This
closely approximates the demographics of the university since most Chinese undergraduates are admitted through CAP.
Eleven of the directly-admitted students self-identified as native speakers of English from countries outside the U.S. Five
majors account for nearly half of the student sample: finance, chemical engineering, accounting, economics, and electrical
engineering, which is consistent with the international study body as a whole (University of Delaware, 2014). However, the
students in the survey also represented 30 other majors. The respondents were equally distributed across the four years of
undergraduate study (between 21% and 27% of the sample in each year).
Of the faculty respondents, 81% had taught international students within the previous three years. They came from 41
departments, majors, or programs. History professors (n ¼ 28) were somewhat overrepresented compared to students’
majors; however, many international students take history classes as part of the general education requirements. Almost
three-quarters of the faculty sample were aware of the ELI, but only 19% knew about CAP.

3.3. Interviews

The second author conducted face-to-face interviews with five former ELI students who had completed the EAP program
with high grades (Table 2). Only Chinese students were interviewed since they are the largest nationality group on campus
and one which faces particular challenges (Stevens, 2012). Successful students were selectively sampled not to be repre-
sentative but rather indicative of the academic and social heights to which Chinese students can aspire at a U.S. university.

4. Results and discussion

Since this is a mixed-method study, the quantitative results from the survey are presented below alongside a discussion
that uses the open-ended questions and interviews to explain and expand on the statistical findings (Creswell & Plano Clark,
2011). Three foci emerged from this process: perceptions of classroom activities; challenges for international students; and
facilitators of success.

2
Other questions are beyond the scope of this paper (see Appendices).
18 N.A. Caplan, S.G. Stevens / English for Specific Purposes 46 (2017) 15–28

Table 2
Interviewee demographic data.

Interviewee Gender Year at UD Major GPAa Time at ELIb

1 M Junior (by transfer credit) Electrical Engineering 4.0 8 months
2 F First year Communications No data 10 months
3 F Junior Chemical Engineering 3.24 6 months
4 F Junior Fine Art No data 1 year
5 F Junior Environmental Engineering 3.3 6 months

Notes.
a
Self-reported grade point average since matriculation (excludes ELI classes).
b
One ELI session lasts approximately two months.

4.1. Perception of class activities

As in Huang (2010), students were asked to rate on a scale of 1–4 how important each of the 21 activities was in their
experience. Faculty, meanwhile, rated the importance of each task in their classes. Differences between the importance
accorded to each task by students and faculty were tested in R (R Core Team, 2014) using two-way c2 statistics (Table 3).3
As can be seen from Table 3, all tasks except one were rated as important by at least half the faculty and students. However,
this masks small but statistically significant differences. More faculty ranked asking questions and participating in class
discussions as important than did students. This may reflect a cultural difference in the value placed on classroom interaction.
As one student explained in her interview, Chinese students are discouraged from speaking in class whereas “Americans
raised their hands, even if they had the wrong answer.”4 Conversely, students ranked a range of activities as more important
than faculty, including group writing and presentations, taking multiple-choice tests and essay exams, writing about their
opinion, and writing research papers. It is possible that students respond based on their experience of a range of courses
across multiple disciplines, whereas faculty typically answer only from the perspective of the course(s) they teach. If about
half of the faculty assign any single task, then over time, most students will find that most tasks are important to them since
they are required to take courses across the university. It is still noteworthy, though, that students place more weight than
faculty on assessments such as tests and exams than on “softer” skills such as class participation.
These results largely support Johns’ (1981) findings that faculty, especially in business and engineering, rank the receptive
skills of reading and listening as very important for ESL students. However, our faculty were more concerned about speaking,
perhaps because of differences between our international population and Johns’s mix of domestic and foreign L2 learners. In
addition, our results are quite different from Huang’s (2010), whose undergraduate respondents rated fewer than half the
proposed skills as important and put the greatest weight on reading and writing. However, Huang’s respondents studied
different subjects (29% in the humanities with relatively few in the physical sciences), were at different stages in their degrees
(40% in their fourth year, while our respondents were more evenly spread across the four years), and may have been less
skewed towards a single nationality (numbers of respondents from each country are not given). Any or all of these factors,
along with students’ motivation, prior experiences, and goals may influence their responses, which further demonstrates that
“needs are neither universal nor everlasting” (Bocanegra-Valle, 2016, p. 614).
Since the faculty on average rated most tasks as important, they were divided into three broad academic fields to test for
disciplinary differences. The categories were based on Cooper and Bikowski’s (2007) classifications, except that arts/hu-
manities (AH) were distinguished from social sciences (SS), which is consistent with the organization of departments in our
university; the third group represents science, math, and engineering (SME). ANOVA tests and post-hoc t tests5 revealed some
significant differences but not for the seven most highly ranked activities (Table 4). Disciplinary variation was significant for a
number of writing, discussion, and presentation tasks as well as multiple-choice tests. For instance, in terms of assessment,
essays and research papers are valued more in arts and humanities and social sciences, but short-answer questions are more
important in both science/math/engineering and social science compared to arts and humanities. This confirms previous
research findings that writing is important across the university (Hale et al., 1996) but also suggests that our students need
preparation in a wide range of genres in order to satisfy the university’s wide-ranging general education requirements (Melzer,
2009), unlike the more specialized program-specific literacies needed in a British university, for example (Wingate, 2015).

4.2. Challenges for international students

Students were asked to rate their success on the same list of 21 tasks. Faculty also rated their international students’
success. Differences between the ratings were evaluated by two-way c2 statistics (Table 5). A wide gap emerged between the
faculty, more than half of whom rated their international students as unsuccessful on 11 of the tasks, and the students, who

3
Since the data violate the assumption of expected frequency in a chi-squared test, the four levels of the survey were combined into two: important and
not important (Turner, 2014). The same procedure was also implemented for perceived success (Table 5).
4
Student interviews and all survey responses are quoted verbatim.
5
Hochberg’s GT2 correction procedure against familywise error was applied because the group sizes were unequal, with a ratio of almost 1.5 between
the largest and smallest (Field, 2009, pp. 374-375).
 N.A. Caplan, S.G. Stevens / English for Specific Purposes 46 (2017) 15–28 19

Table 3
Importance of skills ranked by faculty and students.

Activity Faculty Students c2

Unimportant Important Unimportant Important
Critical thinking 3 (1%) 222 (99%) 5 (3%) 173 (97%) ns
Understanding lectures 4 (2%) 221 (98%) 3 (2%) 175 (98%) ns
Synthesizing information 8 (4%) 217 (96%) 9 (5%) 169 (95%) ns
Asking questions 13 (6%) 212 (94%) 32 (18%) 145 (82%) ***
Taking notes 15 (7%) 208 (93%) 5 (3%) 172 (97%) ns
Time/task management 16 (7%) 208 (93%) 5 (3%) 173 (97%) ns
Reading textbooks 22 (10%) 203 (90%) 15 (8%) 163 (92%) ns
Speaking clearly 27 (12%) 197 (88%) 6 (3%) 172 (97%) **
Participating in class discussions 27 (12%) 194 (88%) 39 (22%) 138 (78%) *
Participating in group discussions/activities 39 (17%) 185 (83%) 33 (19%) 144 (81%) ns
Using sources 41 (18%) 184 (82%) 18 (10%) 159 (90%) ns
Writing short answers on tests 56 (25%) 168 (75%) 24 (14%) 153 (86%) **
Writing essays out of class 63 (28%) 162 (72%) 43 (24%) 135 (76%) ns
Writing research papers 85 (38%) 140 (62%) 23 (13%) 155 (87%) ***
Reading journal articles 85 (38%) 138 (62%) 57 (32%) 120 (68%) ns
Writing about students’ opinions 91 (40%) 134 (60%) 26 (15%) 152 (85%) ***
Taking essay exams 95 (42%) 130 (58%) 41 (23%) 136 (77%) ***
Giving individual presentations 96 (43%) 127 (57%) 29 (16%) 149 (84%) ***
Giving group presentations 97 (44%) 125 (56%) 28 (16%) 149 (84%) ***
Taking multiple-choice tests 105 (47%) 120 (53%) 18 (10%) 159 (90%) ***
Writing papers or reports as a group 111 (50%) 113 (50%) 27 (15%) 151 (85%) ***
Leading discussions 127 (57%) 97 (43%) 73 (41%) 104 (59%) **

Notes. Tasks are listed in descending order of importance as rate by faculty. Faculty n ¼ 221–225, student n ¼ 177–178. Some respondents did not rate every
activity. * p < .05, ** p < .01, *** p < .0001, ns ¼ not significant (p > .05). Ratings were combined: unimportant ¼ 1 (not at all important) and 2 (unimportant);
important ¼ 3 (important) and 4 (very important).

were overwhelmingly confident in their abilities. This concords with previous research (Huang, 2010; Mamiseishvili, 2012).
Faculty and students agreed only that international students are mostly successful at reading textbooks (and, to a lesser
extent, journal articles) and time management.
The qualitative data, however, complicate this picture. Over half of the students (119) wrote comments in response to the
question “what particular challenges have you had at UD?”, and the five interviewees were also open about the difficulties
they faced. This suggests that asking about success only tells half the story: a substantial population of international students
consider themselves successful despite the challenges. Indeed, perseverance in the face of adversity was a theme that
emerged strongly from the interviews:

Table 4
Differences among importance ranking by faculty’s academic fields.

Activity AH SS SME ANOVA

Mean SD Mean SD Mean SD

Lectures 3.86 0.39 3.87 0.39 3.88 0.49 ns
Critical thinking 3.74 0.56 3.87 0.39 3.85 0.36 ns
Synthesizing information 3.63 0.64 3.77 0.50 3.75 0.53 ns
Reading textbooks 3.46 0.91 3.48 0.70 3.53 0.72 ns
Time management 3.43 0.72 3.54 0.62 3.47 0.70 ns
Note taking 3.53 0.77 3.38 0.69 3.49 0.62 ns
Asking questions 3.44 0.58 3.38 0.61 3.41 0.65 ns
Class discussion 3.60a 0.60 3.07b 0.74 3.38a,b 0.78 ***
Speaking clearly 3.49a 0.58 3.16 0.73 3.34a 0.85 *
Using sources 3.41 0.94 3.15 1.01 3.27 1.03 ns
Group discussion 3.28 0.91 3.10 0.79 3.12 0.95 ns
Essays (homework) 3.54a 0.88 2.57a 1.06 3.00a 1.16 ***
Short answer tests 2.73a,b 1.17 3.25a 0.89 3.15b 1.03 **
Reading journals 2.86 1.15 2.49 1.06 2.86 0.98 ns
Essay exams 3.06a 1.15 2.33b 0.98 2.80a,b 1.15 ***
Research paper 3.09a,b 1.05 2.43a 1.07 2.66b 1.13 ***
Writing about opinions 3.00a 0.96 2.43 0.97 2.72a 1.01 **
Individual presentations 3.06a,b 0.97 2.44b 0.98 2.35a 1.02 ***
Group presentations 2.51 1.01 2.43 1.01 2.68 1.09 ns
Group papers 2.12a,b 1.04 2.62a 1.00 2.73b 1.09 **
Multiple choice tests 1.81a,b 1.08 2.57a 1.13 2.93b 1.17 ***
Leading discussions 2.39 0.83 2.36 0.80 2.38 0.82 ns

Notes. Tasks are listed in descending order of overall mean ranking. AH ¼ Arts/Humanities (n ¼ 70), SS ¼ Social Sciences (n ¼ 94), SME ¼ Science/Math/
Engineering (n ¼ 63). Activities were ranked on a scale of 1 (not important) to 4 (very important). ANOVA omnibus tests: * p < .05; ** p < .01; *** p < .001;
ns ¼ not significant (p > .05). a, b Superscripts indicate significant pairwise post-hoc tests using the Hochberg correction (p < .05).
20 N.A. Caplan, S.G. Stevens / English for Specific Purposes 46 (2017) 15–28

Table 5
Perceptions of students’ success by faculty and international students.

Skill Faculty Students c2

Unsuccessful Successful Unsuccessful Successful
Leading discussions 97 (85%) 17 (15%) 77 (46%) 89 (54%) ***
Participating in class discussions 115 (74%) 41 (26%) 53 (31%) 116 (69%) ***
Speaking clearly 94 (63%) 55 (37%) 23 (14%) 147 (86%) ***
Taking essay exams 61 (59%) 43 (41%) 32 (19%) 133 (81%) ***
Writing about their opinions 59 (59%) 41 (41%) 17 (10%) 152 (90%) ***
Writing research papers 53 (58%) 38 (42%) 12 (7%) 156 (93%) ***
Giving group presentations 53 (56%) 41 (44%) 24 (14%) 144 (86%) ***
Participating in group discussions/activities 72 (51%) 69 (49%) 40 (24%) 130 (76%) ***
Using sources (paraphrasing, avoiding plagiarism) 64 (54%) 50 (44%) 13 (8%) 156 (92%) ***
Giving individual presentations 49 (53%) 44 (47%) 23 (14%) 144 (86%) ***
Asking questions in/after class 84 (52%) 78 (48%) 50 (30%) 119 (70%) ***
Writing papers or reports as a group 36 (41%) 51 (59%) 20 (12%) 144 (88%) ***
Writing essays out of class 50 (41%) 71 (59%) 22 (13%) 148 (87%) ***
Synthesizing information from lectures and readings 56 (42%) 78 (58%) 19 (11%) 150 (89%) ***
Reading journal articles 40 (38%) 64 (62%) 55 (33%) 114 (67%) ns
Writing short answers on tests 46 (38%) 75 (62%) 19 (11%) 150 (89%) ***
Understanding lectures 57 (36%) 102 (64%) 11 (6%) 159 (94%) ***
Taking multiple-choice tests 36 (34%) 70 (66%) 13 (8%) 157 (92%) ***
Critical thinking 51 (34%) 98 (66%) 16 (9%) 154 (91%) ***
Taking notes 39 (30%) 93 (70%) 19 (11%) 150 (89%) ***
Time/task management 30 (26%) 86 (74%) 29 (17%) 140 (83%) ns
Reading textbooks 31 (23%) 106 (77%) 28 (17%) 141 (83%) ns

Notes. Faculty n ¼ 87–162; student n ¼ 164–170. Not all participants responded to every activity. The activities are ranked by mean importance as rated by
faculty. Ratings were combined: Unsuccessful ¼ 1 (very unsuccessfully) and 2 (unsuccessfully); Successful ¼ 3 (successfully) and 4 (very successfully). ***
p < .0001; ns ¼ not significant (p > .05).

Yes, [I keep up with the reading] but because I work hard and spend a lot of time, maybe twice or three times more than
Americans, but not everyone does that. I sleep maybe 8 h a night, and the rest of the hours I study. I don’t play games;
the time I spend is only for studying, so it’s a lot, maybe 7 h a day of reading and doing homework.
The high self-ratings of success in reading belie the difficulty many students have in reaching university-level literacy;
several interviewees commented on the steep learning curve between their EAP and undergraduate classes. In order to better
understand these difficulties, the qualitative data were further analyzed, revealing four broad categories of obstacles to
success: linguistic difficulties, classroom interaction, cultural challenges, and academic problems.

4.2.1. Linguistic difficulties

Unsurprisingly, language, grammar, pronunciation, and vocabulary featured prominently as lacks (Flowerdew, 2013) in the
open-ended responses and interviews, especially in faculty comments. Fourteen students listed oral fluency, accuracy, or
general speaking skills as particular difficulties, and a further nine commented more broadly on the “language barrier.”
Faculty commented on communication skills (8), intelligibility (10), and giving presentations (4). Interestingly, no student
specifically referred to difficulties in writing, and only six mentioned reading as being especially difficult, although in-
terviewees talked about the level and quantity of reading. This might be attributed to students’ self-reported use of the
Writing Center, the particular courses they had taken (especially for first-year students), or to the above-average GPAs of the
survey sample. Far more faculty commented on students’ writing (35) and listening comprehension (38), perhaps because
they see a broad range of international students. Comments ranged from sympathetic (“I can only imagine how difficult it is
for someone who does not have mastery of English to keep up in a course like this”) to irritated (“Class pacing is altered; other
students lose patience, at times vocally. Many times they pretend to understand in order to fit in better when in fact they do
not”).
The discrepancies here may be an effect of self-selection, with higher-proficiency students choosing to complete the
survey while faculty perhaps responded based on their weakest students or general impressions formed recently or in the
past. However, even though the results diverge, they still confirm the importance of fundamental oral and written language
skills. More than that, though, the comments point to the multiple ways that language intersects with other aspects of the
academic experience: what faculty see as an oral language difficulty may in fact be a cultural difference in classroom
interaction patterns (see 4.2.2). When a professor struggles with a student’s writing, the problem could be written grammar,
but it could also be a lack of rhetorical or genre knowledge (see 4.2.3), as this faculty respondent realized: “Grammar and
syntax are not as much an issue as formulating arguments about what they have read.” And weak performance could equally
be an artefact of assessment tools (see 4.2.4). It is not surprising then that both students and their instructors default to
language as an explanation for any difficulty, perpetuating the misconception that “academic literacy [is] equal to linguistic
competency” (Wingate, 2015, p. 10). “The challenge is that English is a second language,” wrote one faculty member. The
results show that the real challenges may be very much less obvious.
 N.A. Caplan, S.G. Stevens / English for Specific Purposes 46 (2017) 15–28 21

4.2.2. Classroom interaction

Faculty and students agreed that participation in class and group discussions is a major challenge for international stu-
dents (Ferris & Tagg, 1996a). Many faculty recognized that this difficulty has non-linguistic explanations: “One of the biggest
challenges is that students from Asian countries have a very difficult time becoming a participant in the learning community.
They tend to be on the outside and observe, even when welcomed by the other students.” There is some support for this
generalization from students; according to an interviewee, “in China, students don’t speak intentionally.”
Faculty struggle to interpret such silences: “Many have an admirable knowledge of English but I wonder if they fully
comprehend the language based on the blank stare or nodding head in response to an explanation,” wrote one. A Chinese
student explained: “I think about our group project a lot, and I have good ideas, but sometimes Americans just say it out first.
It seems like I am space out, but I am not.” Oral communication skills are clearly a critical need.
It is certainly the case that some blank stares can be attributed to a lack of comprehension: several students noted the
difficulty of following discussions in which the speech is fast-paced and delivered in multiple accents. It is, however, clear
from both the survey and the interviews that many international students are trying to participate but find themselves
frustratingly stymied, often unintentionally, by the teacher and other students. One Chinese interviewee shared the
following story, which demonstrates the role faculty play in establishing a climate that either promotes or inhibits
participation:
One time, I had an Indian student in my class. He was asking a question and maybe because of his accent the professor
could not answer very well, and he asked the student again and againdand I heard many people laugh, so I didn’t feel
very comfortable speaking. Now I am too nervous to talk, even when the professor calls on me and even though I know
the answerdnothing in my mind.
Regardless of the Indian student’s pronunciation, the instructor’s response had a chilling effect on at least one other inter-
national student. Inasmuch as this study reveals ways in which an EAP program can better prepare students, it thus also
points to the need for improving faculty training so that they enact and model tolerance for linguistic and cultural variation.

4.2.3. Cultural challenges

The influence of culture on all aspects of university learning can be illustrated by this comment from the faculty survey:
“They tend to be very narrow, culturally - especially those from China. For example, when discussing the carbon dating of the
Shroud of Turin, I’ve had several students ask me who Jesus Christ was!” The exclamation point is telling: for this professor, it
is unimaginable that students would not share knowledge of a religion practiced by only around 5% of the Chinese population
(Pew Research Center, 2011). Another listed “understanding US systems of government” as an obstacle, and a third com-
plained that international students sit together and talk in their native language so “they are not learning American ways.”
Other faculty, however, acknowledged students’ lack of background knowledge and detailed ways in which they support
cultural schema building.
Many students are equally frustrated by their lack of cultural knowledge:
When I was in the probability course, the professor gave many examples about the game that he played as a child, but
I’m a foreigner, I don’t know that game. Like dice, poker, and a lot of other things that I don’t know. Even though I know
the knowledge, I don’t get the cultural part.
While it may be possible for a pre-matriculation program to build background knowledge about the U.S. Constitution and
major western religions, it is much harder to predict the multitudinous ways in which a lack of shared culture can obstruct
comprehension.
Such obstacles extend beyond cultural schema and were difficult to capture in the quantitative data. In their comments
and interviews, though, students highlighted their need, especially in their first year, to better understand the university
system, such as choosing classes and negotiating teaching styles, including expectations for group work and discussion. Here
too may be included the striking number of comments about the challenges of social life, which are beyond the scope of this
paper but important for their impact on students’ overall experience (Andrade, 2006; Andrade & Evans, 2009; Mamiseishvili,
2012) and may be seen as a broader want. As one student wrote on the survey:
I think people often overlook the fact that it’s not just your classes that are in a different language so you have to work
harder, the connections you make with people are sometimes more difficult to forge as well for the same reason.
Pleasingly, though, 78% of former CAP students reported having a close American friend, higher than both directly
admitted students in our survey (69%) and Gareis’s (2012) nationwide sample (62%). This is especially striking since Gareis
found that East Asian students were significantly more likely to have no American friends than international students from
other countries. Once more, despite the challenges of social life, a majority of students and a large majority of former ELI
students report that they are succeeding.
From the faculty’s perspective, an important cultural struggle was academic honesty and appropriate source use. There
was a significant difference between the number of faculty (over half) and the handful of students who felt this was an area
of difficulty for internationals. This may be due to unwillingness to self-report unethical behavior, lack of awareness of the
problem, or a mismatch between the courses students in the sample have taken and those taught by the faculty in our
22 N.A. Caplan, S.G. Stevens / English for Specific Purposes 46 (2017) 15–28

survey. Nonetheless, the 26 comments by instructors in this category point to a need that combines linguistic and cultural
competence. Our response to this need depends on whether the students accused of plagiarism and cheating in the survey
were CAP or directly admitted students. Appropriate academic honesty has always been a focus of EAP courses at the ELI,
and interviewees often mentioned source use and citation as something useful that they learned in EAP classes. Therefore,
it is possible that some students need these skills reinforcing in their academic classes. However, if plagiarism is a greater
concern among directly admitted students, this finding casts doubt on the policy of admitting international students based
on standardized proficiency tests without providing greater post-matriculation ESL support.
A related area of need is subsumed under the admittedly vague concept of “critical thinking,” on which students were
rated unsuccessful by just over a third of the faculty. Survey comments help explain how these instructors interpreted this
skill, although such definitions may certainly vary by discipline or even idiosyncratically. Several noted the importance of
applying and not just memorizing or repeating information. Others were more specific:
Sometimes, the concept of being “free” to express personal opinions, or to express opinions critical of governments,
professors or other authority figures, is a challenge.
The international students with whom I’ve worked have a very difficult time integrating ideas from multiple areas
(class readings, discussions, examples, etc.) and thinking critically about the significance of what they read.
Several also reflected on their progress in this area, for example:
As I met many classmates and professors who have different views on single issue, I would say I could enhance my
critical thinking and communication skills. Many people see only the surface when they face an issue. I was the one of
them before I learn how to see what I can’t see. It would be the most worthy skill to gain as a college-student.
A Chinese engineering student had also clearly learned to adapt to a non-authoritarian teaching style:
Every student can have their own opinion even if it’s totally against the professor’s opinion, but the professors really
like that. They like students to challenge, and I think that’s very different from my country, and I think it’s very good.
It is plausible that students who do not realize this expectation are inadvertently contributing to faculty’s impression that
international students on the whole do not participate in class.

4.2.4. Academic problems

Most comments that specifically related to academic performance focused on assessment. Students rated themselves
as more successful on all types of test than did faculty, which is possible since the respondents were in general slightly
stronger than the overall international population. In the sample, 68.5% of former ELI students and 76.2% of direct
admits reported GPAs of 3.0 or higher, whereas the actual average GPA of all international students is a little below 3.0
(Table 1).
Many students reported struggling with understanding instructions on class assignments or essay exams, for example:
I understand the lectures and most of the reading materials, but during the tests I just don’t get it and I don’t know why.
I just don’t know what the professors want. I know I’m supposed to highlight the main point when I read, but I don’t
know what the main point is!
For the history class we wrote essays for the exam, and most of the feedback was that I had great structure, but I didn’t
answer the question.
Since many of the same interviewees claimed to understand both the lectures and the readings, it seems that the problem is
less with language than communication and clarity. It is one thing for students to learn words like “critique,” “examine,” and
“trace,” but it is another altogether to “read” a professor and understand how to satisfactorily address a prompt. Other
students complained about difficulties with multiple-choice questions, which some found confusing. One respondent noted
that the problem was often the time limit, not the content:
Some class only have 50mins during MWF [i.e. a class that meets for 50 min on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday each
week], so when taking those exams in class, I feel [I] don’t have enough time to take it. I have met an exam [which] is 75
multiple choice for using just 50mins, maybe that is easy for Americans, but English is not my first language, reading
question would takes a lot of time away.
Assessment problems were echoed by some faculty, who often attributed the difficulty to lack of vocabulary and language
deficiencies, which students’ comments suggest is only one of many possible explanations. One professor, for instance,
acknowledged the time constraint but did not seem inclined to make any accommodation:
Often the students have issues completing the exams which are a combination of multiple choice and open ended in
the time allotted, which isn’t typically an issue with students where English is a first language.
Another showed an entirely different attitude to assessment:
 N.A. Caplan, S.G. Stevens / English for Specific Purposes 46 (2017) 15–28 23

One student in particular was very interested in the topic and worked amazingly hard. [.] If I had graded him only on
what he wrote on the exam without knowing him and talking to him after classes, he would have failed. He could not
write English. But I graded him by reconstructing what the fragments of his language led me to believe he understood.
Ultimately, it is impossible to disentangle the linguistic, cultural, and social capital (Bourdieu, 1986) needed for success in a
university course or degree program. Interpreting the professor’s intention, familiarity with test formats, time, and language
proficiency combine in complex ways. But tests and exams are an ineluctable part of the undergraduate experience.
Cultural and social capital are manifest in other comments on the survey that relate to finding and using the support
resources available. One survey respondent admitted:
Self discipline is hard for me in my first year at UD. Besides, I failed to actively seek help from instructors or take
advantage of UD sources like “writing center” [or] “career service”.
Other students felt the opposite: “I love UD. As an engineering major, my classes are bound to be difficult but there are a lot of
resources.” The survey results support these contradictory comments. Students were asked to indicate which support services
they had used as an undergraduate (Table 6). The most frequented were the Career Services Center and Writing Center, but
even their utilization rates were only around 50%.
Faculty observed a related problem, students who do not take advantage of available support.
I have offered an opportunity to create study groups or study pairs between international and US students, but no one
has come forward to express interest in this opportunity.
[International students] almost never seek help, even when prompted to do so in comments I have made on exams and
papers. I’m happy to help all students improve their writing skills, but international students never come to office hours
or make other appointments to discuss assignments and exams.
There is, to be sure, a cultural dimension to this behavior, which relates to the lack of effective teacher–student interaction
(see 4.2.2). Some of the responsibility, though, lies with faculty. One interviewee explained that her professors do not let her
revise some assignments and set due dates that do not allow for the use of the Writing Center.

4.3. Facilitators of success

The needs analysis is also informed by the experiences of students who have succeeded at the university. Necessarily, the
focus of this paper is on perceived lacks and felt needs, but these should be balanced with the lessons learned from
matriculated international students who have successfully negotiated the university (Benzie, 2010; Mamiseishvili, 2012).
The negative comments from faculty (see 4.2) are tempered by students’ reports of classes and professors that have truly
helped them grow personally and academically. In the interviews, these students almost always demonstrate openness to
new ways of teaching and learning as well as a high degree of strategic competence. The engineering student showed well-
deserved pride in his success:
I am kind of proud of myself because the professors know me because I engage in the class, come up with some
questions, post them in SAKAI [online course management system]. I’m kind of active, not like when I was in China. I
changed and now I’m active and like to talk to the professor and give them my new ideas, even if they aren’t exactly
right, but it’s new, so the professor likes it, the professor knows me. One thing I think is very important is keeping an
open mind. I think American students do that very very well.
A junior, who had started as an accounting major on her parents’ advice before changing to fine art on her own volition, had
this to say about her teachers:
Sometimes they gave me more time on exams or let me use a dictionary or asked me to come to their office hours.
Professors are busy and you have to go to them. When I had a problem I definitely went to my professors, but when it’s
not serious then I talk with my classmates, sometimes they help me more than the professors [.]. The one thing that’s
different, the biggest difference between Chinese and American education is that China is like, prepare everything and
throw it on you and I just accept it, but in America it’s like I have all the things here, but I have all the gaps and I have to
find a way to swim between them and get it.

Table 6
Use of support services.

Support Service ELI (n ¼ 128) Direct Admit (n ¼ 63) Total (n ¼ 191)

Career Services Center 63 (49%) 39 (62%) 102 (53%)
The Writing Center 63 (49%) 34 (54%) 97 (51%)
Math Tutorial Lab 19 (15%) 8 (13%) 27 (14%)
Academic Enrichment Center 15 (12%) 10 (16%) 25 (13%)
Center for Counseling 15 (12%) 2 (3%) 17 (9%)
Office of Disabilities Support Services 2 (2%) 0 (0%) 2 (1%)
24 N.A. Caplan, S.G. Stevens / English for Specific Purposes 46 (2017) 15–28

The survey is also replete with positive feedback from faculty who appreciate international students’ work ethic and the
diverse perspectives they bring to class. Many students, too, show signs of meeting the areas of needs outlined above:
I experienced seeing a question/problem from a very different perspective. [.] I learned that to better understand the
world and real-life, you really need to “step out of the cycle”, think differently.
Further analysis of the data is needed to pinpoint the dispositions, behaviors, and strategies which have worked for successful
students in order to refine our instructional models.

5. Limitations

Although the response rate was adequate, it is impossible to know why the remaining 74% of UD’s international students
did not complete the survey. In addition, the self-reported GPAs suggest that low-achieving students generally, and struggling
directly admitted students in particular, are underrepresented in the sample. The students who responded are more suc-
cessful than the overall international population, but it is possible that some faculty were responding based on experiences
with their least successful international students. Importantly, the two surveys are not matched; that is, we have no way to
know whether the students referenced in the faculty study are those who responded to the student survey, nor vice versa.
Therefore, the quantitative results in particular should be treated with caution. The mixed-methods design, however, com-
pensates to some extent so that the broad themes of the needs analysis may be considered reasonably reliable (Onwuegbuzie
& Johnson, 2006).
Several faculty took pains to point out a weakness of the survey instrument. The 4-point Likert-type scale, although used in
other similar studies (e.g., Huang, 2010), is problematic because it forces respondents into categorical ratings of important or
unimportant, successful or unsuccessful. As one instructor complained: “On the prior questions, there is too much separation
between being successful and unsuccessful. I’d say international students are frequently marginally successful.” This was also
problematic for faculty who have encountered a wide range of student abilities: “The previous page was pretty difficult to fill
out because some international students do very well with the tasks and some do terribly with the tasks, so I had to generally
average it out.” In addition, the tasks themselves are subject to interpretation, and we do not know what all faculty and
students understood by such umbrella terms as “essay” or “research paper.” We concur with Huang that self-report ques-
tionnaires are fallible and unreliable. Thus, the statistical analyses have influenced the inferences drawn from this research less
than the qualitative data, and further research into the actual genres assigned is needed as part of ongoing curricular review.
Finally, although business-related fields are the most common majors of international students at the university in general
and in the survey specifically, no student from these disciplines was interviewed. Experiences that are particular to business
courses may, therefore, not be represented here. However, themes expressed by business students in the survey are present in
the interviews, suggesting that they nonetheless capture experiences that can be generalized to the broader university
population.

6. Implementation

The results of the needs analysis have directly informed the revision of the ELI’s curriculum for conditionally admitted
students. The new course sequence, called Academic Transitions, addresses many of the concerns expressed by faculty and
students.6 At the advanced level, the existing reading/writing and listening/speaking classes have been collapsed into an
integrated-skills course, “Foundations in English for Academic Purposes.” This class more closely approximates the practices
of university courses, allowing students to practice synthesizing information from lectures and textbooks in their discussions,
presentations, and writing. Active reading skills and paraphrasing are taught in the context of key academic writing tasks that
will serve students across the disciplines: summary, response, and synthesis. At the same time, students take elective courses
to build their cultural schema alongside their academic and social skills. Examples include English through the 1960s, English
as an International Language, and English through Drama.
This strategy of simultaneously developing students’ linguistic, cultural, and social capital has been achieved through two
more innovations. Academic Transitions incorporates the ELI’s successful Cohort co-curricular program, which facilitates
meaningful interaction among international and domestic student mentors and connects students with campus resources. In
addition, CAP students will now enroll in one to two transitional semesters in which they take an expanded version of the
first-year seminar in composition (a requirement for all UD undergraduates) taught by ELI faculty in collaboration with the
English Department. They will also take credit-bearing courses towards their general education or major requirements, with
scaffolded ESL support. In some courses, enrollment of domestic and international students is strategically balanced so that
intercultural communication becomes part of the content as well as the reality of the classroom. Participating faculty report
that the 50/50 distribution tends to minimize the intimidation many internationals feel in classes dominated by native
speakers, resulting in greater interaction and participation among all class members.
Academic Transitions thus provides a shallow entry to the university for conditionally admitted undergraduates, replacing
an instructional model which offered high levels of support up to the edge of the precipice, after which students had to sink or

6
Full details can be found on the ELI’s website, http://sites.udel.edu/eli/programs/cap/at.
 N.A. Caplan, S.G. Stevens / English for Specific Purposes 46 (2017) 15–28 25

swim. The new courses promote the facilitators of success identified in our research by affording students the opportunity to
experience and succeed in academic classes, where they can fully engage in the cultural, linguistic, and social practices of US
higher education.

7. Conclusions

The purpose of this needs analysis was to identify the particular needs, challenges, and success strategies of international
undergraduate students in the context of a single university in order to inform the development of a revised EAP curriculum.
As such, the first implication is the importance of conducting such an analysis in the local context rather than relying solely on
extant research (Bocanegra-Valle, 2016; Hamp-Lyons, 2001).
While the results reaffirm the importance and difficulty of academic literacy (Wingate, 2015), they also underscore the
enormous challenge of oral communication in and out of the classroom. Previous research suggests that this is not limited to
our context nor to the business, economics, and engineering students who dominate our survey (Ferris & Tagg, 1996a, 1996b;
Huang, 2010; Johns, 1981). Discussion and conversation skills can be taught in EAP programs, but the ability to hold the floor
in a small class of ESL students does not necessarily predict success in large-class discussions or small group projects. Some
responsibility for creating an inclusive atmosphere on campuses committed to internationalization must fall on the faculty
and the student body as a whole.
At the same time, international students can greatly enhance their chances of success by seeking opportunities for
engagement and integration. Globalization, however, is not accomplished merely by the presence of students from abroad:
universities can facilitate meaningful interaction through policies and programs, such as those at UD as a result of this needs
analysis. All stakeholders need to “step out of the cycle.” With stronger strategic competence on the part of international
students, wider access to and use of robust support services, and a little more tolerance from everyone, the goals of academic
success and social engagement on a genuinely globalized campusdeven in a small mid-Atlantic towndcan surely be
achieved.

Acknowledgements

The authors gratefully acknowledge the contributions to the needs analysis of their colleagues on the EAP Task Force at the
University of Delaware English Language Institute: Karen Asenavage, Kendra Bradecich, Kenneth Cranker, Scott Duarte, and
Russ Mason. They also thank the editor of this journal and the anonymous reviewers for their insightful feedback.

Appendix A. Survey for International Undergraduates

Note: The survey was delivered online and began with an IRB-approved letter requesting participants’ informed consent.

1. What is your home country? Please select United States if you are NOT an international student (i.e. you do not have a
visa).
2. What do you consider your first (native) language?
3. What is your major?
4. Did you study at the UD English Language Institute (ELI) before you started your degree? Yes/No
5. What is your approximate cumulative GPA at UD? (below 2.0/2.0–3.0/3.0–3.5/3.5–4.0)
6. In your classes at UD, how important are the following activities? Not at all important/unimportant/important/very
important
a. Understanding lectures
b. Taking notes
c. Asking questions in/after class
d. Participating in class discussions
e. Leading discussions
f. Participating in group discussions/activities
g. Reading textbooks
h. Reading journal articles
i. Taking multiple-choice tests
j. Writing short answers on tests
k. Taking essay exams
l. Writing essays out of class
m. Writing about your opinions
n. Writing papers or reports as a group
o. Writing research papers
p. Giving individual presentations
q. Giving group presentations
26 N.A. Caplan, S.G. Stevens / English for Specific Purposes 46 (2017) 15–28

r. Using sources (paraphrasing, avoiding plagiarism)

s. Critical thinking
t. Speaking clearly
u. Time/task management
v. Synthesizing information from lectures and readings
w. Other (please specify)
7. How well do you feel you perform in these areas? Please rank each activity; do not choose anything if you have no
experience with a particular task. Very unsuccessfully/unsuccessfully/successfully/very successfully [the same list of
tasks as in Question 6 was presented]
8. What particular challenges have you had at UD?
9. In what aspects of your life at UD have you been most successful?
10. Have you used any of the following?
a. The Writing Center
b. Career Services Center
c. Academic Enrichment Center
d. Office of Disabilities Support Services
e. Center for Counseling
f. Math Tutorial Lab
11. Have you participated in any of the following?
a. UD student club or organization
b. Community service (volunteering)
c. Student government
d. UD sports team
e. Fraternity or sorority
f. Other:
12. Do you have any close American friends? Yes/No
13. Were you a CAP student at the ELI? (CAP ¼ Conditional Admissions Program) Yes/No
14. CAP students only: Were you in a CAP Cohort at the ELI? Yes/No
15. Compared to ELI classes, how difficult do you find UD classes?
a. UD classes are easier
b. They are about the same
c. UD classes are harder
16. Please explain your answer: what is different about your UD classes and your overall workload?
17. Is there anything else you would like to tell us about your experience at UD or the ELI?

Appendix B. Faculty Survey

Note: The survey was delivered online and began with an IRB-approved letter requesting participants’ informed consent.

1. In which department or major do you most often teach undergraduate students?

2. In your undergraduate courses in the discipline you selected above, how important are the following activities for all
students? Not all important/not important/important/very important
a. Understanding lectures
b. Taking notes
c. Asking questions in/after class
d. Participating in class discussions
e. Leading discussions
f. Participating in group discussions/activities
g. Reading textbooks
h. Reading journal articles
i. Taking multiple-choice tests
j. Writing short answers on tests
k. Taking essay exams
l. Writing essays out of class
m. Writing about your opinions
n. Writing papers or reports as a group
o. Writing research papers
p. Giving individual presentations
q. Giving group presentations
r. Using sources (paraphrasing, avoiding plagiarism)
s. Critical thinking
 N.A. Caplan, S.G. Stevens / English for Specific Purposes 46 (2017) 15–28 27

t. Speaking clearly
u. Time/task management
v. Synthesizing information from lectures and readings
w. Other (please specify)
3. How do your international (English as a Second Language) undergraduate students perform in these areas? Please rank
each activity, leaving rows empty if you have no experience with international students on particular tasks. Very un-
successfully/unsuccessfully/successfully/very successfully
[The same list of activities as in Question 2 was presented]
4. What particular challenges have you had when working with international undergraduate students who speak English as
a second language?
5. In what ways do international undergraduate students contribute to your classes?
6. Are you familiar with any of the following?
a. The English Language Institute (ELI)
b. The Conditional Admissions Program (CAP)
c. The Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL)
d. The International English Language Testing System (IELTS)
7. Other faculty members have told us that they offer some of these accommodations to non-native speakers of English in
their undergraduate classes. Please check anything you have provided for ESL/international students in your classes.
a. Extra time on tests
b. Extensions on major assignments
c. Allow dictionaries during tests
d. Opportunities to revise and resubmit assignments
e. Additional study groups
f. Additional office hours or meetings
g. Adaptations to handouts
h. Providing PowerPoints or lecture notes in advance
i. Adaptations to lectures
j. Recommend the Writing Center
k. Recommend Office of Academic Enrichment services
l. Recommend the Math Lab
m. Recommend counseling services
n. Refer to the Office of Disability Support Services
o. Other accommodation or support:
8. Is there anything else you would like to tell us about your experiences teaching international undergraduate students?

References

Andrade, M. S. (2006). International students in English-speaking universities: Adjustment factors. Journal of Research in International Education, 5, 131-154.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1475240906065589.
Andrade, M. S., & Evans, N. W. (2009). International students: Strengthening a critical resource. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield.
Bartlett, T., & Fischer, K. (2011, November 3). The China conundrum. The Chronicle of Higher Education. Retrieved from http://chronicle.com/article/Chinese-
Students-Prove-a/129628/
Belcher, D., & Lukkarila, L. (2011). Identity in the ESP context: Putting the learner front and center in needs analysis. In D. D. Belcher, A. M. Johns, & B.
Paltridge (Eds.), New directions in English for specific purposes research (pp. 73-93). Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.
Benzie, H. J. (2010). Graduating as a “native speaker”: International students and English language proficiency in higher education. Higher Education
Research & Development, 29, 447-459. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/07294361003598824.
Bocanegra-Valle, A. (2016). Needs analysis for curriculum design. In K. Hyland, & P. Shaw (Eds.), The Routledge handbook of English for academic purposes (pp.
608-625). New York: Routledge.
Bodycott, P. (2009). Choosing a higher education study abroad destination: What mainland Chinese parents and students rate as important. Journal of
Research in International Education, 8, 349-373. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1475240909345818.
Bourdieu, P. (1986). The forms of capital (R. Nice, Trans.). In J. G. Richardson (Ed.), Handbook of theory and research for the sociology of education (pp. 241-
258). Westport, CT: Greenwood Press.
Coates, H. (2009). Engaging students for success: Australasian student engagement report. Victoria, Australia: Australian Council for Educational Research.
Retrieved from http://research.acer.edu.au/higher_education/17
Cooper, A., & Bikowski, D. (2007). Writing at the graduate level: What tasks do professors actually require? Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 6, 206-
221. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jeap.2007.09.008.
Creswell, J. W., & Plano Clark, V. L. (2011). Designing and conducting mixed methods research (2nd ed.). Los Angeles: SAGE Publications.
Eggington, W. (2015). When everything’s right, but it’s still wrong: Cultural influences on written discourse. In N. W. Evans, N. J. Anderson, & W. Eggington
(Eds.), ESL readers and writers in higher education: Understanding challenges, providing support (pp. 199-208). New York: Routledge.
Evans, N. W., Anderson, N. J., & Eggington, W. (Eds.). (2015). ESL readers and writers in higher education: Understanding challenges, providing support. New
York: Routledge.
Ewert, D. E. (2011). ESL curriculum Revision: Shifting paradigms for success. Journal of Basic Writing, 30, 5-33.
Ferris, D., & Tagg, T. (1996a). Academic listening/speaking tasks for ESL students: Problems, suggestions, and implications. TESOL Quarterly, 30, 297-320.
http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/3588145.
Ferris, D., & Tagg, T. (1996b). Academic oral communication needs of EAP learners: What subject-matter instructors actually require. TESOL Quarterly, 30, 31-58.
http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/3587606.
Field, A. P. (2009). Discovering statistics using SPSS (3rd ed.). Los Angeles: SAGE Publications.
28 N.A. Caplan, S.G. Stevens / English for Specific Purposes 46 (2017) 15–28

Flowerdew, L. (2013). Needs analysis and curriculum development in ESP. In B. Paltridge, & S. Starfield (Eds.), The handbook of English for specific purposes
(pp. 325-346). Malden, MA: John Wiley & Sons.
Gareis, E. (2012). Intercultural friendship: Effects of home and host region. Journal of International and Intercultural Communication, 5, 309-328. http://dx.doi.
org/10.1080/17513057.2012.691525.
Greene, J. C., Caracelli, V. J., & Graham, W. F. (1989). Toward a conceptual framework for mixed-method evaluation designs. Educational Evaluation and Policy
Analysis, 11, 255. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/1163620.
Hale, G. A., Taylor, C., Bridgeman, B., Carson, J., Kroll, B., & Kantor, R. (1996). A study of writing tasks assigned in academic degree programs (No. TOEFL-RR-54.
Princeton, NJ: Educational Testing Service.
Hammond, B. G. (2009, November 15). The Chinese are coming, and they need help with the admissions process. The Chronicle of Higher Education.
Retrieved from http://chronicle.com/article/The-Chinese-Are-Coming-and/49126/
Hamp-Lyons, E. (2001). English for academic purposes. In R. Carter, & D. Nunan (Eds.), The Cambridge guide to teaching English to speakers of other languages.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Horowitz, D. M. (1986). What professors actually require: Academic tasks for the ESL classroom. TESOL Quarterly, 20, 445-462. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/
3586294.
Huang, L.-S. (2010). Seeing eye to eye? The academic writing needs of graduate and undergraduate students from students’ and instructors’ perspectives.
Language Teaching Research, 14, 517-539. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1362168810375372.
Institute of International Education. (2016). Open Doors 2016 fast facts. Washington, DC. Retrieved from http://www.iie.org/Research-and-Publications/
Open-Doors
Johns, A. M. (1981). Necessary English: A faculty survey. TESOL Quarterly, 15, 51-57. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/3586373.
Leask, B., & Carroll, J. (2011). Moving beyond “wishing and hoping”: Internationalisation and student experiences of inclusion and engagement. Higher
Education Research & Development, 30, 647-659. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/07294360.2011.598454.
Leki, I. (1995). Good writing: I know it when I see it. In D. D. Belcher, & G. Braine (Eds.), Academic writing in a second language: Essays on research and
pedagogy. Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
Leki, I., & Carson, J. (1997). “Completely different worlds”: EAP and the writing experiences of ESL students in university courses. TESOL Quarterly, 31(39).
http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/3587974.
Long, M. (2005). Second language needs analysis. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Mamiseishvili, K. (2012). International student persistence in U.S. postsecondary institutions. Higher Education, 64, 1-17. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10734-
011-9477-0.
Melzer, D. (2009). Writing assignments across the curriculum: A national study of college writing. College Composition and Communication, 61, 240-261.
Onwuegbuzie, A. J., & Johnson, R. B. (2006). The validity issue in mixed research. Research in the Schools, 13, 48-63.
Pew Research Center. (2011). Regional distribution of Christians. Washington, DC: Author. Retrieved from http://www.pewforum.org/2011/12/19/global-
christianity-regions/
Powers, D. E. (1986). Academic demands related to listening skills. Language Testing, 3, 1-38. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/026553228600300101.
R Core Team. (2014). R: A language and environment for statistical computing [Software]. Vienna, Austria: R Foundation for Statistical Computing. Retrieved
from http://www.R-project.org/
Rosenfeld, M., Leung, S., & Oltman, P. (2001). The reading, writing, speaking, and listening tasks important for academic success at the undergraduate and
graduate levels. (No. 21). Princeton, NJ: Educational Testing Service.
Stevens, S. G. (2012). Chinese students in undergraduate programs: Understanding and overcoming the challenges. Wrap-Up, 9(1), 1-9. Retrieved from
https://www.nafsa.org
Sullivan, P., Zhang, Y., & Zheng, F. (2012). College writing in China and America: A modest and humble conversation, with writing samples. College
Composition and Communication, 64, 306-331.
Tinto, V. (1998). Colleges as communities: Taking research on student persistence seriously. The Review of Higher Education, 21, 167-177.
Turner, J. L. (2014). Using statistics in small-scale language education research: Focus on non-parametric data. New York: Routledge.
University of Delaware. (2014). Snapshot statistics for the 2014–2015 academic year. Retrieved from http://www.udel.edu/oiss/resources/statistics/Fall2014/
Comp-with-shortsheet-Fall2014.pdf
Wardle, E. (2009). “Mutt genres” and the goal of FYC: Can we help students write the genres of the university? College Composition and Communication, 60,
765-789.
Wingate, U. (2015). Academic literacy and student diversity: The case for inclusive practice. Bristol, UK: Multilingual Matters.

Nigel A. Caplan is an Assistant Professor at the University of Delaware English Language Institute and chair of the EAP Task Force. He holds an M.S.Ed in TESOL
and is a doctoral candidate in Education, researching collaborative writing and genre pedagogy in ESL.

Scott G. Stevens is the Director of the University of Delaware English Language Institute and coordinator of the MA TESL program in the School of Education.
He holds an Ed.D. in Educational Leadership from the University of Delaware.