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FACULTY OF HUMANITIES MOSTAR

ENGLISH DEPARTMENT

SELF-ASSESSMENT REPORT

Contents
0.0 INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................................. 4 0.1 About the Department todays context ........................................................................................ 5 1.0. Study program and Curriculum ....................................................................................................... 9 1.1. Educational aims level and orientation (Indicator 1.1.) ............................................................ 9 1.2 Specific requirements .................................................................................................................. 11 2.0 Curriculum ....................................................................................................................................... 16 2.1 Teaching aims and content ......................................................................................................... 16 2.2 Professional and academic interrelatedness in our curricula .................................................... 18 2.3 Coherence of the curriculum....................................................................................................... 20 2.4 Student workload ........................................................................................................................ 20 2.5 Learning process and curricula coherence .................................................................................. 21 2.6 Final paper(s) ............................................................................................................................... 24 3.0 Human resources............................................................................................................................. 25 3.1. Quality of academic staff members ........................................................................................... 25 3.2 Academic and professional involvement of academic staff members ....................................... 28 3.3. Number of employed academic staff members ......................................................................... 33 4. Students............................................................................................................................................. 37 4.1. Evaluation and grading/testing of student's work ..................................................................... 37 4.2. Practical work ............................................................................................................................ 39 4. 3. Students and their opinions ...................................................................................................... 41 4.4 Students in the teaching process at the English Department ..................................................... 42 5. 0 Infrastructure.................................................................................................................................. 44 5.1 Material aspects .......................................................................................................................... 44 6. Internal Quality Assurance ................................................................................................................ 48 6. 1. (Non) existence of QA policy ..................................................................................................... 48 6.2. and 6.3 Measures for curriculum improvement and cooperation with alumni and the labor market ............................................................................................................................................... 50 7.0 Results (Criterion 7) ......................................................................................................................... 53 8.0 Future activities ............................................................................................................................... 55

Annex 1 Students Annex 2 Teaching staff Annex 3 (International) Projects and activities of the academic staff members Annex 4 Theses Annex 5 Some of the questions from the student questionnaires (40 students evaluated) Annex 6 - Results of a poll conducted with alumni of the English language department Annex 8 Matrix of learning outcomes Annex 9 Structure of the study program and Description of the qualification

0.0 INTRODUCTION

This Self-assessment report is being written within the Tempus project, as a preliminary trial that will help real evaluation and accreditation process to be carried out at all B&H universities in the next couple of years. The Project foresaw participation of four study programs from the eight, state-owned universities in B&H. The English Department applied to take part in the process at Dzemal Bijedic University of Mostar. After initial meetings of the Consortium members and listening to good practices from some of the participating European universities, the English Department decided to create a Working group for production of SAR that consists of: Dr. Edina Spago-Cumurija, asst. prof., Head of the Department, group leader Iris Memic, senior TA at English Department, permanent staff member at IT Faculty Adi Maslo, TA, Dzemal pago, senior teaching assistant.

All members of the English Department were informed about the beginning of the Tempus project and will be kept informed and involved in all activities planned within the Project.

0.1 About the Department todays context

Faculty of Humanities has these five departments: Bosnian Language and Literature English language and Literature German Language and Literature History Communication studies

The English Department was founded in 1999, when the Faculty of Humanities was formed. Together with the Bosnian Department, it constituted the Faculty of Humanities from the very beginning and the Department academic staff members have been taking part in all strategic and development processes of importance for the Faculty of Humanities. Department was founded due to the need for elementary and high-school English teachers in the environment. It started before Bologna challenges entered the area of B&H higher education, so it was designed according to the traditional curricula in B&H. The program was aimed at training of future language and literature teachers, in a threeyear period, shaped after a program that had existed at Sarajevo Teacher-Training College prior to the war. However, the Faculty was forced to extend this curriculum into a four-year study program, to fit a usual length of undergraduate programs in Bosnia&Herzegovina. It is how the program is organized now, and in the academic year of 2012 we will enroll first Master students who will be offered one-year second-cycle program(s). The Department has about 300 students at the moment (detailed numbers in the Annex 1). Most of them are full-time students and another category is part-time students who have the same obligations and rights like full-time, but they do not have to attend all the classes. They come mainly from Herzegovina-Neretva Canton, but also from Sarajevo, Tuzla, Central Bosnia and other parts of B&H. The Department has twelve employees, and others come from other departments in Humanities or other faculties and universities in B/H, mainly from Sarajevo.

At the moment, higher education in B&H is in a very unique and difficult situation. It is lingering somewhere in between traditional and new system. The state has thirteen ministries of HE, and Herzegovina-Neretva Canton itself has two universities (Dzemal Bijedic University and Sveuciliste/University of Mostar). The city, as well as its higher education is divided on a political basis. Unfortunately, political processes affect development and trends in the two universities, which is a major obstacle to having independent and autonomous universities in this country (having in mind that autonomy is the only way to have a quality education at any level). We are again witnessing a politically caused collapse of highereducation process in this Canton, in the days of finishing this report (HE sector, together with other public sectors in the country, is in a non-operational condition, due to the funding and political gap caused by non-forming of a new Government in the HN Canton, which prevents normal functioning of the University)1. However, the University and its English Department are trying to do their best in such a context. One positive thing is technological development and availability of modern technological tools that support easier research and teaching process. Luckily, Dzemal Bijedic University has an IT Faculty that is leading in its area in the country but in the wider region as well (first started and developed its own e-learning software, teaching methodology and materials). The English Department has good cooperation with the IT Faculty and we already started exchange of staff, knowledge and technologies applicable in our teaching process, for advancement of both our teaching staff and our students. The English Department uses one classroom of the IT Faculty for performing of Teaching Methodology classes and one full-time employee from the IT Faculty is engaged in our teaching process, within the course on Teaching Methodology. Employees of the English Department are young and well aware of the need for different knowledge delivery that will encourage students independent and critical thinking. We all have energy, but our main obstacle for full implementation of a modern teaching process is an inadequate infrastructure, with no sufficient space, classrooms or money to purchase

Although the visit of the Evaluation Group to the English department has been postponed to March 2012 and the Government was finally formed in December 2011, the situation at Dzemal Bijedic University is even worse at this moment (January 2012). After the rector and his team resigned in the summer semester last year, the University has not elected a new rector yet. That means that all reform processes have been interrupted and it is difficult to say when this crisis will be resolved.

teaching aids and equipment. So far, we are balancing trying to improve teaching methodology with the resources available. Funding is a permanent difficulty for our University, which reflects on the situation at the Department. Our study program proves to be very attractive, according to a steady number of students who apply for enrolment every year. For the academic year of 2011/2012, we have 32 full-time students enrolled in the first year, 18 part-time students and 20 transfers of students from some other study program, from different departments and universities in B&H. This number of 70 new students in the next academic year is the highest at our Faculty (among the five existing departments)2. In the recent period, we introduced some changes in the curriculum, toward more practical skills and competences, such as translation, correspondence, IT literacy, which all attracts students who need more practice and less theory during their studies. We are only at the beginning of the process, but determined to keep adjusting our curriculum in line with the market needs, in order to improve quality, attract students, cooperate with the community and assure our position on a more and more competitive market of higher education. The biggest issue we are facing on a daily basis is legal framework in our Canton and at the state level. Generally speaking, Bosnian universities cannot meet preconditions needed for full implementation of Bologna principles for several reasons: there is no a state-level ministry or body that would regulate HE, there are no funds for teaching or research activities, B&H is not a member of European mobility programs, the state is fragmented in all sectors which is reflected in HE too, etc. In addition to these, state-level problems, Dzemal Bijedic University is burdened with the fact that Herzegovina-Neretva Canton hasnt adopted Act on HE (political reasons), which is the precondition for any further activity. So far, we are in a gap, waiting for the HE act to be adopted, and at the same time reluctant to undertake any activities prior to this legislative precondition. Dzemal Bijedic University functions according to a pre-war act (1992), with amendments adopted from time to time. In such a situation, we have some Bologna elements, but cannot implement all of them due to the legislative. The English Department is trying to improve
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The difference in the number of new students comes from the fact that after we submitted this report, more students trasnferred to the Department .

elements that can be changed, as it was mentioned above, such as quality of teaching, employability factor in the curriculum, international cooperation etc. In the last couple of years we have been trying to connect more to the market and the community so our students have obligatory practical work that now takes several months (October-April), and they spend it working in a school once a week, providing children with an additional English class every week in the above-mentioned period. Also, after a meeting (20 September 2011) of the representatives of the Department with management of the TV1, a new media house in B&H, we agreed on signing a cooperation agreement with them in October3. They already have five of our graduate students running their Department for translation and subtitles and we plan to organize practical work for our third-year students at this television. For the future we also plan to expand these practical activities to some other institutions and organizations where our students could be involved not only in teaching English and translating / interpreting but also some other English language related jobs. We want to build our niche in the community in terms of quality and competences of our graduates. The English language and literature skills and knowledge are very needed in Mostar and a wider area, and we have to be competitive enough to ensure our students employment upon completion of their studies. All these elements will certainly be treated separately and into more details in the SAR, but in this introductory part we can say that this Department certainly has many limiting factors, many weaknesses and threats, but also a great potential, especially considering the fact that almost all of the obstacles we are facing now result from the outside sources (legislation, funding, political situation) and less from inside. The Department has young staff members with international experience and enough energy to cope with the existing problems.

The Agreement was signed and third-year students have spent this (winter) semester working at the Subtitles Department at TV1.

1.0. Study program and Curriculum

1.1. Educational aims level and orientation (Indicator 1.1.)

The English Department has been actively involved in all projects coordinated by European Commission, and the last one was focused on reform and modernization of the curricula at BH universities. Also, English Department is participating in a new Tempus project on creation of competences-based curricula, through which we will evaluate our new curriculum adopted in May 2011, in order to understand better the new concept and structure of studies and finally introduce necessary adjustments in defining of competences in our study program. Within current context, our Department seems to be several steps ahead of others in terms of awareness of the need for connecting studies with real life needs of our students. However, it is even more difficult in such a position to implement some novelties in our study program. Practical work of students, calculation of their workload, cooperation with external partners in the community is still not legally regulated at our University. However, we have been working on our curriculum in the last three years and in May 2011 we introduced a new curriculum which is competence based (we took into consideration professional, specific and general competences as well). We also kept in mind while working on this modernized curriculum the wider framework of national competences for the first cycle. They include critical thinking, self-directed and lifelong learning and other general competences that can be built in all study programs. Having in mind practical competences, we ensured through evaluation and grading procedures, as well as homework assignments, that our students start from the very beginning of their studies to conduct initial research, processing of information and working on solutions individually and in groups. We also insist on usage of technical support (research and presentation tools).

For the existing, first-cycle program we produced a matrix to match the competences we set as our goal in curriculum and evaluation methods with generic competences at the state level (Annex 8 Matrix, Excel sheet). We defined general competences for the qualification (stated in the following chapter), competences for each course, but also competences not related to the very qualification, but rather transferable skills, critical thinking, team work, ethical values and independent work, all of which being integrated within the courses, in the way we evaluate students' work, deliver knowledge in interaction with students or just in the form of some regulations/ recommendations through which we encourage fair and transparent acting of both teachers and students. Our intention is to plan specializations for the master level, for students who want to specialize in teaching methodology, translation, literature or something else, according to the needs of our community. Our master cycle will be based again on the national-level references for the second cycle and in the future we will try to strengthen links between the two cycles. Practical work of our students is something that we are going to focus on more and more, and so far we succeeded in establishing good contacts with a school in Mostar where our students spend several months a year working with children. Our new activity in this direction is above mentioned cooperation with Television TV1 which hires five of our ex students who now run the entire translation section of this Television, which covers entire B&H. The cooperation agreement was signed in October this year, and our students have been taking their practical classes during this winter semester. We intend to look for more partners in the community to the mutual benefit of our students and these institutions/companies. Our strength related to this indicator is that we are fully aware of the need to strengthen links between the academic community and the labor market and needs of our community. However, this is not generally recognized and regulated in our documents, which leaves space for further isolation of our universities as purely academic institutions. Also, we do not have a data base on employers and the market which could help us to improve our curricula.
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There is a Career center at the University level but at this point it only offers trainings and education, but without real support from the University, which prevents real results (collectted and processed data on the employment possibilities for our students).

1.2 Specific requirements

Earlier in our Self-assessment report we mentioned specific situation when it comes to the qualification we offer at foreign language study programs in Bosnia&Herzegovina. Since foreign-language departments traditionally have been educating elementary and high-school teachers, the qualification (since it is a public service) has to be recognized and approved by the state bodies and ministries in this new, Bologna system. However, being aware of the pace at which changes are introduced in Bosnian-Herzegovinian legislation, we decided to think and act in advance. We decided to keep a four-year length for the first cycle and one year for master studies having in mind traditional trust in four-year programs. This year we finalized formal changes in our program in order to change it fully from a content-based to a competence-based program. Since we have been aware of Bologna trends in the previous years, we had enough time to adjust gradually our program. Having in mind that our students might not be allowed to teach in public schools after finishing their first cycle, in the last couple of years we have integrated some additional competences into our study program. This applies to translation skill and especially transferable skills, in form of independent courses, but also as part of other courses. In the last months, due to the fact that the head of the English Department has been active in all CoE projects from their very beginning, as well as a member of University-level body for accreditation, a final adjustment was formally adopted and implemented in the English Department, but also in all other departments in Humanities. All other

programs/departments at the University also have been informed about the Project implemented by the Council of Europe and their recommendations, and the Guideline Book

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has been handed out within the entire academic community. This dissemination and training process is to be continued at the University.

The English study program offers a four-year first cycle and one-year master (first master programs to be offered in the academic year of 2012/2013). Having in mind the qualification, the program offers general competences for the qualification (after the first cycle), so our students will:
o acquire language skills at B2+ level of CEF scale4 (Vantage level from Common European Framework of Reference for Languages, Council of Europe http://www.coe.int/t/dg4/linguistic/cadre_en.asp) for the four basic skills (listening comprehension, reading, writing and speaking)

o acquire the fifth skill, translation (written), at the level of knowledge on types of translation and ability to recognize and avoid the most common mistakes in translation process; independent translation of texts at the aimed level of language use, with a focus on bureaucratic style, having in mind current context of our society which is in the process of European integrations o acquire knowledge, skills and attitudes in the area of teaching methodology and education, needed for work in elementary and high schools o be able to use technical support such as computer programs for text processing, programs for presentations and other general computer tools, but also specific devices and equipment such as a smart board (interactive education board) that the Department purchased a few months ago, that represents modern technologies application specifically designed for the future profession of our students.
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The first attempt to introduce CEF scale in our curriculum was undertaken by our first English Language Fellow (the US funded program), prof. Judy Rittenhouse, and in cooperation with her and ELF Office in Budimpest at the time, we decided to set B2+ as our goal for senior students. In addition to this, the Working group for English studies within CoE Project (2009-2011) during their work agreed that C1 level will be a goal set for master students of English (see Curriculum developement Guide, Council of Europe, 2010). However, in our future work we will adjust our scale further in accordance with expert recommendations and trends in B&H.

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o communicate and be able to work as a member of a team but also individually, generally speaking but also specifically when it comes to conducting research on language and teaching methodology issues.

The study program we offer at our Department is internationally oriented, due to the very nature of (English) language and we use CEF scale and standards to keep it transparent in a wider context. From its foundation in 1999, the Department has had foreign (native) speakers teaching language and culture groups of courses (permanent English-Language Fellow funded by the US Government but also some other visiting professors and lecturers from the States or European countries). Some of our students have been to the US for study periods, again funded through US Government programs, but student (im)mobility still remains the biggest problem. Bosnia & Herzegovina is still left beyond mobility networks, which prevents our students from gaining benefit from international education and cooperation.

However, it is easier for our staff members to travel and spend some time at some international universities, and literally all the time we have somebody from the Department involved in some international activity (our colleague just returned from a one-semester stay in the US, participation in several Tempus projects, a new prestigious scholarship for our senior TA in Literature etc.).

Thanks to personal dedication and efforts of our academic staff members, the Department benefits from new experiences and methodologies, knowledge and equipment we gain through our international activities. In this way, we are using our personal and professional experiences to improve our work in the Department. We are a young community (see data from the chapter on Human resources) and that is our biggest strength.

As mentioned above, the Department has been introducing changes in our curricula in recent years, especially when it comes to additional skills (translation, cultural elements in the curricula) and transferable skills that we find extremely important in any curricula.

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International projects and cooperation of individual staff members provide us with opportunity to get familiarized with new trends in our professions. Recently our staff members have been taking part in several new events: a new Tempus project on teacher training: Modernizing Teacher Education in a European Perspective MOTED a new Tempus - CCMLL Center for Curricula Modernization and Life-Long Learning, with University of Girona as the coordinator teacher training seminar in the Language Center of the Cultural Center in Mostar (six members from the Department took part as lecturers or participants); a new seminar is to be organized on 20 January 2012, with several teachers from our Departments involved as lecturers. Teacher workshop organized by our ELF lecturer at the American corner. Student conference, funded by the US Government, American Corner Mostar (2011).

The Department is trying to keep in touch with international trends and activities related to the program we offer.

As mentioned above, there has been an initiative from the Rectorate level to modernize curricula in line with recommendation from the CoE project SHE III (Head of Department one of the members of the University Accreditation Group), so we are now ready to implement improved curriculum the next academic year. When it comes to the competences we offer, the most important issue is the fact that competence-based curricula are not regulated and introduced in Bosnia and Herzegovina officially. Some pilot activities have been undertaken in this direction and it is very difficult to change teaching methodology, evaluation and grading procedures without support from the University and faculty management. Our advantage is that we have been actively participating in all pilot projects dealing with curricula reform in B&H, and we are ready to continue working on it. It will require stronger communication with our graduate students and employers, so we plan to:

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develop our own platform for communication with students (in cooperation with IT Faculty)

establish an alumni association organize surveys and communication with potential employers and community in general

strengthen our Department and develop it as a center for teaching methodology and best practices which will cooperate with elementary and high schools in our Canton, as well as other professionals/organizations from the field of teaching methodology but also translation and possibly some other areas. We already initiated talks with the Cultural Center of King Fahd in Mostar, which has already organized several seminars/workshops for English teachers, in order to provide human and infrastructural support for our further activities, to the mutual benefit of both institutions.

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2.0 Curriculum

Working on our new, adjusted curriculum, we used a top-bottom approach, in which we started with global competences, having in mind national guidelines, and the next step was transferring these competences into a structured curriculum which should help our students achieve the top competences of their qualification.

2.1 Teaching aims and content

The structure of our program can be seen in the Annex 9. We planned horizontally and vertically interrelatedness of our courses and respective competences, with general and specific ones. We planned linguistic track, literature, teaching methodology/pedagogy, translation and cultural one. Through these tracks, our students can build their professional skills and competences. Within the project on Curricula Modernization and LLL in which our partner is University of Girona, we are transferring their good practice of competence testing to our Department, with a software bought for B&H universities within this Tempus project. In this way, we will be able to test and measure value of our competences, individually and within our study program as a whole (first training on usage of the software planned for February this year, in Sarajevo). This experience and results of this work will be integrated in our curriculum immediately upon their completion, through standard procedures for curricula development (Faculty Council and University Senate approvals). Our permanent partners when it comes to the curriculum content are American lecturers who have been working at the Department since 2004. As already mentioned, we consider it very important to keep our students informed and communicate with them on a regular basis in order to get their opinion and consequently improve our work. At the same time, we are trying to keep them updated on the relevant research from our scientific field, so we have integrated knowledge gained through international activities and scientific work in our curriculum. Thus, this year we have offered several elective courses based on our own research. In addition to courses, we offer some extracurricular activities, such as a workshop organized by our senior TA (to defend his PhD thesis on the language of English comedies in January 2012), who has organized a workshop on stand-up comedy and has been working with

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students since the beginning of this academic year. They are to have their first public performance in May 2012. Our students unfortunately dont have many opportunities for academic exchange, but they have been using the existing programs regularly (each year one student spends one year studying in the US, they are members of student organizations and projects offered in B&H). IR Office is supporting these activities in a very good way, publishing regularly information on available programs and supporting students with their applications. In this process, we will continue to take active part in all state-level or university-level bodies for improvement of our study program, since we believe that we can best improve our curriculum through permanent training and education.

As already mentioned, we still dont know what our Bologna students will be entitled to do (this year our first class of Bologna students will graduate) since there are no legal regulations at the state or cantonal level on Bologna qualifications, and we have to wait for the authorities in charge to adopt all needed acts and laws in this sense. Also, we are not members of European mobility networks. However, we are trying to incorporate in a best possible ways our knowledge and experience, from our own research and international projects, into the curriculum. In the future, we will: test our competences and grading/evaluation procedures in the new Tempus on curriculum development and LLL (training on software usage in February in Sarajevo, and then training for our staff members will be organized) keep encouraging our students to apply for international mobility projects join new international projects in order to gain best practices we need in our work keep pursuing our own research and scientific activities, trying to ensure funds with our own efforts, the same way we have been doing so far, without any support from our institutions.

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2.2 Professional and academic interrelatedness in our curricula


Since our students are going to be professionals in education and/or translation in a society that is inevitably influenced by global trends and especially technologies, it is very important for us to integrate tools that will provide our students with an opportunity to continue with self-education and learning after they complete the cycles of studies we can offer to them. With this regard, we can recognize several positive elements in the curriculum: Students are encouraged to work individually or in groups from the very beginning of their studies. Almost each course foresees students' production of papers, projects, presentations etc. There are individual courses that deal specifically and exclusively with research (Diploma Paper Research Methodology, Teaching Methodology) or transferable skills (IT, Written Correspondence etc.) In addition to these, many other courses have integrated student research elements. Finally, students have practical work in their final year of the first cycle, in which they work in our partner school and after they complete that practical work, they present their experience through a group research paper on a selected topic (on teaching methodology issues such as motivation, new school concept in B&H/inclusion, Traditional vs. modern school, creativity, importance of teachers in schools etc and all these papers can be read by all students afterwards.) In this work, they have to function as a team. We will have to wait for a couple of years to contact these students who are having these new courses and practical work (introduced in the last three years), to see a bigger picture and check how much students benefit from such courses and experiences.

A new project that the Department is planning is equipping of a classroom that is going to be an experimental/demonstration classroom for our students and staff, which is going to be used for organization of demonstration classes in cooperation with elementary and high schools. This project is yet to be worked on, although we have taken some initial steps to purchase some equipment (language lab, interactive education board, beamers through international
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projects). These days, we are submitting a new application to our Ministry of Education for further equipping of this classroom.

Another aspect that is developing at a quite fast pace is research of our academic staff members. We have been working on our theses, research papers and projects and integrating them into our curriculum, as mentioned earlier in this Report.

Again, we expect (although not fully rely on at the moment) external support, such as Career Development Center, Student Union and other services that can help our students' with research, volunteering or other activities.

There are, however, several obstacles to our efforts with this regard. Our students have to face the fact that in B&H unemployment rate reaches up to 70%; our universities do not have infrastructure suitable for students' activities, not to mention research; our labor market is not really promising when it comes to selection of jobs students can apply for, etc.

Briefly stated, we have integrated practical elements in our teaching already, including practical work of students and student research, in order to prepare them as much as possible for the labor market. The main obstacle is non-existence of a structured support from the University and society when it comes to student community/practical work. The society itself is underdeveloped and doesnt offer too many opportunities for young people in general. We hope to be able to draw conclusions in the forthcoming period through communication with our graduate students, in order to improve our curricula further and make it fit the environment and (hopefully) changes in legislation in the best possible way.

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2.3 Coherence of the curriculum


As already mentioned, there is no system that would enable connections between the real needs of the community and curricula offered at BH universities. This applies to Dzemal Bijedic University and Mostar/Herzegovina-Neretva Canton too. There is a University strategy document produced several years ago which foresees a development group whose members are to be University representatives and all other external stake-holders (representatives of companies and various institutions). This body is to be formed in the integrated University and its main task would be ensuring that curricula development is in line with economic trends in the country, region and internationally.

2.4 Student workload

Last year, a University Working Group for Accreditation was established and the English Department had its representative there (Head of the Department being a member of this Group). Representatives of all eight faculties have been meeting regularly, which resulted in new regulations on Bologna studies, which were adopted by the University Senate. These documents dealt with calculation of student workload too. The University accepted an approximate value of one ECTS ca 25 hours of work (based on previous measuring and student pools carried out in several earlier projects). While writing our syllabi, we had this recommended number in mind planning student activities. Some courses require more individual student work, and some (especially theoretical, purely linguistic subjects) put more weight on lectures and work with teachers during contact hours in the classroom. (ECTS distribution can be seen in Structure of the study program and in the Curriculum) Main obstacle in full implementation of ECTS and their transfer is again the fact that legally ECTS are not recognized, although they have been assigned in all programs at our University.

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2.5 Learning process and curricula coherence


It has been a lucky coincidence that the English Department took part in the SHE III Pilot Project. All English departments from B&H were working together for a year, and the result was a master program for which the syllabi were written by all the members of the working group. Additionally, all English Departments from Bosnia& Herzegovina (including even some private ones) exchanged their curricula and other information, and we even started some exchange of lecturers among ourselves. As a result, all the English departments can take into consideration qualities of other English programs, adjust some courses, and also make some distinctive courses to make their Department unique. The English Department in Mostar has some specific qualities (we believe that is translation element and focus on transferable skills and IT), but still we can recognize many courses from other B&H departments when students want to continue their education at our Faculty in Mostar. As mentioned earlier, the Working group for Accreditation at the University level started working this academic year. Regulations for each of the three study cycles have been written by working groups and the English Department, just like all others, started implementing new regulations in the ac. year of 2011/12. Some novelties (toward Bologna principles) in these regulations are: fewer exam terms (based on permanent evaluation and successive grading upon completion of a semester) recommended formula for student workload calculation (approximately 1 ECTS equals ca. 20-25 hours of work). We started applying these improved syllabi during the academic year of 2011/2012. The weakness here is lack of students' activity in all these processes. Our Student Union is not very active when it comes to these practical issues dealing with exact information related to the teaching process. Generally, the Department, the Faculty of Humanities and the University itself should consider education of students on the Bologna process and their stronger involvement in all reform processes as soon as possible. From our Academic Council meetings, e.g. it is visible that very often no student representatives (two of them
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appointed) are active or present at all in any activities at the Faculty. It might be that priorities of students are some other problems, such as inappropriate accommodation and dormitories, high fees etc. This is a step to be undertaken very soon, since our students are the main stake holders in higher education. The study program we offer relies on contemporary didactics. This can be verified through at least these elements: The program that offers education and training in foreign language and teaching methodology is already based on clear methodological principles and it is logical that teachers at this Department themselves will follow all trends in teaching methodology. Our students are taught on today's teaching methodologies, approaches to education and communication, and from that point of view our students in better position as compared to other programs. Our teaching staff has been very active in many trainings, and the Faculty even organized a conference on CEF (in 2005 see Chapter 3 Department projects), which makes us a disseminator of new approaches in teaching methodology. Very young and energetic staff members who live surrounded by new media and technologies which is inevitably reflected in our work and teaching. The study program is structured in a way that students acquire more general competences in the first and second year, and later on they can focus on specific competences and those more closely linked with their profession. (For the full structure and explanation of the study program and its logics see the appendix Description of qualification) As mentioned earlier, almost each course foresees students' active participation and work, which all lead to top competences we set as target for our program. Our students can follow tracks of linguistics, language skills, teaching methodology, translation, transferable skills, culture and literature. By combining electives, they can strengthen competences in certain areas, but teaching methodology, computer literacy and communication and presentation skills are obligatory and well integrated in the curriculum. Such a program enables students to be prepared for either market and finding a job or further education in master and doctoral programs.
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The main obstacle in this respect is non existence of support for our students, in terms of guidebooks, a quality web site, brochures and other promotion material that could help them to get to know better the Department and its offer and keep them informed throughout the study program duration. Today, such a problem is actually very significant and we are to improve this aspect of our work very soon. At the moment, we offer only first cycle of studies, but the second cycle is due in the year 2012. Master studies are also regulated at the University level, and a good thing that interdisciplinary and joint masters are encouraged and made possible in new rule books. The English Department, as mentioned, took part in writing of a new master in teaching methodology (within CoE SHEE III Project), but we plan to prepare carefully our master program/s during the next academic year. We will use results of our survey with graduated students, in order to meet demands of our market. We count on internationalization and Europeization trends in B&H for better placement of our students in the labor market in our country but also beyond our borders. As one of our students said in the students' newspaper: The English language is increasingly present everywhere so I have hope after I finish these studies (Student, p.9, issue of May 2011) All members of the Department are working as a team, all of us willing to improve the teaching and learning process, despite numerous obstacles in our environment. We find it extremely important to strengthen communication with our students. We have made some steps in this direction (starting a Department page which allows faster flow of information, organizing several meetings with students and being at their disposal for all information and question every working day. Still, we need a system to convey all information relevant to students as fast as possible, in a most convenient way. That will require efforts from the Faculty and University and at least the following: production of informative materials/brochures/documents for students before the beginning of the next academic year, which will enable them to have full information on the curriculum, requirements, evaluation procedures and all other details on the teaching and learning process. organization of info day and other forms of promotion of the Department activities.
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finalizing of the construction of a new faculty building which will enable easier work and teaching activities and meeting of quality requirements whn it comes to needed resources.

Since we cannot do this independently as a Department, we hope that the Faculty will act soon in this direction. In any case, the Department will continue a good practice of meetings with our students, in order to exchange information (also in the form of written information, announcements, syllabi etc.), impressions and find solutions for potential problems.

2.6 Final paper(s)

At the University level it has been agreed that students will write a final paper at the end of both cycles (Bachelor and Master). In the English Department, we will offer the first master program in the year of 2012/2013. Concerning the first-cycle final paper, we have a course on Methodology of scientific work in the fourth year, during which they work on a topic. In this process, they apply all the skills and knowledge acquired throughout their studies, and get ready for the diploma paper production. For our master programs, we plan to introduce more practical work (translation practice in TV1, practical work in schools, cooperation in the field of teaching methodology with the Cultural Center of King Fahd as well as some new partner institutions, such as ministries, private companies, institutions, schools etc.). We plan to enable our students to combine practical work with final paper production defining of problem, research and writing process.

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3.0 Human resources

We consider our human resources the most positive side of this Department. All the details on the staff members can be seen in the Annexes 2, 3, and 4. We have applied for the two teaching assistants within the support from the Ministry of education this semester, and we hope to get funds by the Ministry.

3.1. Quality of academic staff members

Faculty of Humanities was established in 1999 and at the time it developed and adopted regulations and rules on all academic issues. It was, of course, based on the University legislation valid at the moment of the foundation of the Faculty. Thus, all the regulations on promotion of academic staff members are described and prescribed in the Faculty Statute and Regulation Book. However, after the country signed the Bologna declaration in 2003, the state bodies have been working on adopting of new procedures for higher education area, including those on academic staff member issues. Since our country has a two-entity and ten-canton structure, and the Herzegovina-Neretva Canton has two universities itself, the whole procedure has been lingering and it is still not finished. We have now only a draft Cantonal act on HE, which might be a start for building up of further legal acts. Faculty of Humanities, including its English Department, has now its strategic place in a new, integrated University (integration still not formally finished). Consequently, all the University procedures on academic and non-academic staff quality are decided on at the University level. In this, transitional period, we act according to our old regulations. There is one central nonacademic unit (only three employees) which deals with all the administrative procedures, in cooperation with the University central legal unit.

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In the last couple of years, several new academic staff members have been employed, due to an increased number of students and raised awareness of the faculty management about quality of staff and the teaching process.
14 12 10 8 6 4 2 0 Permanent academic staff members

2008 2009 2010

Graph 1. Permanent academic staff In the years after its foundation, and in line with its strategic plans, the Faculty started a postgraduate study for further education of its own young staff members. It was more convenient for our own young teaching assistants not to travel to Sarajevo or other Bosnian universities for postgraduate education. At the same time, all the staff members have spent some time studying, conducting research or working on some projects at numerous universities and research centers in Europe and the United States (see Annex 3). Such experiences enable transfer of good practices in teaching process, which is helpful in organizing classes under circumstances we have currently in Mostar. Although overburdened with the number of classes, working in unsuitable infrastructure, our young academic staff members prove every day to have strong will to contribute to the teaching process and make it better and innovative, which can be proved by novelties in the program introduced every year. All this energy is supporting work of the Department and so far is able to cope with numerous obstacles the Department has to face on a daily basis. Human resources are not regulated within an QA system, since there is no a QA system fully developed and implemented at BH universities. We will have to wait for new procedures and regulations on academic staff members, but in the meantime, we will: continue our own education and training
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continue following of quality trends in our environment promote and rely on the quality culture of each individual, which is the best way for acquiring quality in a system or without it (like in our case where everything depends on individual efforts and energy)

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3.2 Academic and professional involvement of academic staff members

As stated above, there is a lot of international experience that helps implementation of academic process at the Department. It has been applying for different international projects, through which the Department organized visits of numerous visiting professors from abroad, such as: 1. Sue Russel, North Londond University, UK (1999) 2. Andrew Cote, through Soros media Center (2000) 3. Prof. Branko Tosovic, Institute for Linguistics, University of Graz, Austria (2008) 4. Roland Reed, full professor from Catholic University (several stays through US Government funds 2004-2008, planned for 2012) 5. Judy Rittenhouse, English Language Fellow (2005, 2006) 6. Erin Whittig, English Language Fellow (2006, 2007) 7. Andrew Smith, English language Fellow (2008) 8. Lisa Hundley, English Language Fellow, (2009 and 2010) 9. Prof. Roland Reed, applying underway for the summer semester 2012

Like all other colleagues from other BH universities, members of the English Department at Humanities in Mostar have at their disposal very reduced opportunities for travelling and international cooperation, due to non-existence of appropriate state or canton-level funds or mobility networks. Even when working on their own magistar and doctoral theses, most of the costs are covered by the candidates themselves. This prevents stronger involvement of our academic staff at international level. However, numerous successfully implemented projects and cooperation activities prove again existence of positive energy and expertise of young academic staff that still, in spite of everything, conduct research, attend international conferences and produce and publish scientific papers internationally (Annex 3 for individual CV details). Even under such circumstances, several projects have been implemented.

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Another thing worth mentioning is knowledge and skills of the staff members when it comes to foreign languages. A lot of staff members are fluent in several foreign languages (German, Spanish, Italian, French), which support the image of an internationally-oriented Department. In our curriculum also, for several years now (since 2003), we have been offering Spanish, Arabic and German as foreign languages to our students, through lists of elective courses. Lecturers for these courses are provided through cooperation with Spanish, Egyptian, and German embassies and their cultural departments. This proves to be a good decision, since an increased number of students have been enrolling these courses every semester.

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Table 1 Department projects


Type of project Teaching staff No Name of project Project of relevant Ministries CCMLL - Center for Curricula 1. Modernization and Lifelong Learning Modernizing Teacher 2. Education in a European Perspective MOTED Tempus 2010 Iris Memic Edina SpagoCumurija Council of Europe 2009and the European Commission 2011 Edina pagoDumurija International projects Start/end involved in the project

Tempus

2010-

Edina pagoDumurija

3.

Strengthening the higher education in B&H III Curriculum reform in BH departments of English, Economy, and Mechanical Engineering Scientific Differences project on among

University KarlFranz, Institute of Linguistics, funded by Austrian Ministry of Science and Research

20072010

Edina pagoDumurija

Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian 4. Languages

5.

IT Learning Course in Egypt

Egyptian Embassy in B&H

2 weeks in 2009 April 2009

Selma Raljevic

Language test design for 6. Common European Framework Standards

US Embassy in B&H

Edina SpagoCumurija

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Dzemal Spago Introduction of the ECTS 7. system at the B&H universities; TEMPUS; Project JEP 18041-2003 STRENGTHENING QUALITY 8. ASSURANCE IN BOSNIA AND HEREZEGOVINA; TEMPUS; Project JEP 19074Management of scientific 9. research projects Dzemal Bijedic University& International Forum Bosnia STRENGTHENING THE HIGHER 10. EDUCATION IN B&H II Development of HE qualifications in B&H CEF Conference Mostar, Faculty of Humanities, organization of the 11. conference and a presentation on CEF (Common European Framework for foreign language learning and teaching) at BH universities Strengthening the higher 12. education in B&H I ENIC/NARIC Network for B&H Council of Europe 2003and the European Commission 13. Tempus project JEP 16110, "Curriculum development for 31 Tempus 2002Iris Memic 2005 Edina pagoCumurija Council of Europe 2006and the European Commission US Embassy in B&H, English language Fellow program for SE Europe 2005 Edina pagoCumurija 2008 Novembe r 2007 Selma Raljevic Edina SpagoCumurija 2004 2007 Edina SpagoCumurija 20042007 Edina SpagoCumurija

Edina pagoCumurija

three cycles of IT studies with internationally recognized diplomas"

2005

Quality management procedure for promoting 14. university-enterprise cooperation (QPPEUC); TEMPUS Project SCM CO24A06_BIH; BOSHMAN (Education 15. management research & training project for BiH) Tempus project SCM C010B06, "IT qualification 16. framework for higher education in Bosnia and Herzegovina"

Tempus

20012004

Edina SpagoCumurija

Norwegian Embassy in B&H

20012004

Adi Fejzic

TEMPUS

2006

Iris Memic

Greater Europe for Greater 17. Solidarity Youth Exchange,

Youth in Action Programme, Madrid, Spain

2010

Amila Palikuca

The Department has been actively involved in numerous projects, but we need more research projects. Thus we plan to apply for funds through existing programs, in order to support our scientific activities.

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3.3. Number of employed academic staff members

At the moment, the Department is understaffed. It has insufficient number of academic staff members per each academic rank. The most employees are at the moment within category of teaching assistants. However, it should be noted that, in spite of all real difficulties when it comes to employment of new staff members which exist especially in HerzegovinaNeretva Canton, there is a very visible trend of employment of new, young staff members (Graph 2 and Graph 3):

6 5 4 3 2 1 0 20-30 30-40 40-50 50-60 60-70 70-80 Age in Decades

Graph 2. Academic staff - age distribution

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4 3 2 Male 1 0 20-30 30-40 40-50 50-60 60-70 Female

Age in Decades

70-80

Graph 3. Age and sex distribution staff members At the moment, some of our academic staff members are not paid through the cantonal budget for HE, but directly from the Faculty. This poses a financial difficulty for the Faculty, but, on the other hand, proves its dedication to development of the English Department. The Graph 1 proves a high increase in the number of newly employed, young academic staff members. Another optimistic indicator is an increased number of staff members promoted in higher academic titles. Very soon the Department will have a sufficient number of assistant professors (see Annex 2). The problem will very soon be how to hire new teaching assistants, since we will have an urgent need for further hiring. If the Cantonal Government continues to undervalue importance of HE in this Canton, we will not be able to plan development of the Department, Faculty or the University in a satisfactory way. In this sense, what we might need is more serious turning toward the market opportunities for raising additional funds for our needs, which will then definitely affect amount of scientific work at the University.

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10 8 6 4 2 0

2008 2009 2010

Graph 4. Trends in the number of academic staff members by academic titles

9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0

2008 2009 2010 2011 2012

Graph 5. Academic staff classification with the year of 2012 included, based on the existing realistic indicators

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When it comes to the office staff, the Faculty has only three employees: 1. Celebija Tikvesa, Student Records Officer, graduated from Teacher-Training Faculty, in the field of education studies 2. Nerman Katica, support staff at the Student Record Office, two-year law degree 3. Sanela Kuko, Faculty PR office , four-year degree in Bosnian language and Literature As already mentioned, we applied for two new teaching assistants. Also, we hired a new assistant for the summer semester of this academic year from the funds of the Faculty. Unfortunately we cannot do a lot without financial support from the Canton/state and the society in general when it comes to hiring new staff members.

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4. Students

The Indicator 4 of the B&H criteria for accreditation foresees dealing with students' issues in higher education and their specific position and role in departments and programs to be accredited.

4.1. Evaluation and grading/testing of student's work

Study program at the English Department is designed having in mind certain competences and final results of education we offer to our students. All the skills, knowledge and attitudes we want

to transfer and encourage in our students are interconnected. Evaluation itself has a specific place and role in this system. When planning our curriculum, we took into consideration certain criteria for evaluation of specific aspects of students' work. We structured our program in accordance with CEF, European framework for language learning and we follow its descriptors for specific levels. Thus our students are expected to gain a minimum of B1 level at the end of their first study year and B2+ level at the end of their first cycle. This implies language skills, but also sociolinguistic and pragmatic competences in line with CEF descriptors. All language and linguistic courses have been designed having in mind specific descriptors for each level. The fact that there is a European framework that can be a tertium comparationis for our program is an advantage for us and makes planning of our syllabi much easier. Evaluation processes are regulated in new University documents and have been activated at the beginning of this academic year. The weakness that has to be overcome in this area is usage of information technologies and dissemination of information among students. All students get an info sheet and syllabus for each course, but students who do not come to the first class might skip that information. There is no online base or some kind of pool of information that students, and especially part-time students can use at any time. We are trying to overcome this problem by regular emails to our students with teaching materials (other than books) and our new FB page is quite helpful. However, this problem might be solved much easier by creating a
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software/platform or some kind of IT support that would enable students to get learning material in an easier way, in a direct communication with the faculty/Department. Also, our official web site does not contain all the documents with information for students about all aspects of their studies. In individual courses, it is easier to deal with problems by stronger personal involvement. Each staff member is trying to talk to students on a daily basis and keep them informed about requirements and obligations and tasks. It seems that in this transitional period (toward Bologna) students also are not fully adjusted to permanent evaluation/grading of their work and very often mid-term results have been below average results at final exams (can be seen at request in the reports on exams). Also, additional problem is less exam terms in general as compared to the pre-Bologna study model. Students regularly submit a request for additional exam terms after a semester. That can be an indicator of a slow reform process. We hope to improve that with a new schedule of exams (only five during a year vs. eight or ten before)
We developed some more precise criteria that help us evaluate student work and they can be seen in the Description of qualification. They are typical of language studies but also include some generic standards (independence in work, selection of methodology, not tolerating plagiarism etc. - please see the attached document). Depending on the aims within each syllabus, students are expected to take mid and final exams, oral and/or written, do a presentation of an individual or group work, write seminar paper or do some practical work and research (especially in linguistics-related courses where they use various internet resources, newspapers, TV programs etc. for their papers)

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A positive aspect of English studies is definitely very nature of its content, since all of the staff members have finished teaching methodology courses and is familiar with pedagogical and teaching issues. Non-existence of a University-level quality assurance system is our biggest problem. Teachers are still left alone when it comes to evaluation and grading of student work. We have to think about clear procedures that would be applied at the University. There are such procedures, but only generally defined, and this area is to be further developed and treated in the future. The English Department will continue education through international activities and projects, as well as seminars and round tables on reform topics, which help us improve our work.

4.2. Practical work

Practical aspect of our teaching process was limited to performing one demonstration class in

an elementary or a high school for the entire four-year study program. Three years ago, after initial contact with some colleagues from Brighton University (we applied for one Tempus project together), we introduced almost one-year practical work for our students. Although our project proposal was not accepted by the European Tempus committees, we exchanged some ideas through preparation of this application and we were introduced to Brighton University's concept of community oriented learning, and decided to try to implement it in Mostar. This concept we have been practicing for three years now and so far, both methodology teachers and students have been satisfied (good results in students' polls). Our students work in the partner school for more than one semester (from October to April). They hold extra classes of English for children. The benefit is mutual: pupils get additional classes for free and students get in touch with their future profession in the most practical manner. They are obliged to research a specific topic during this practice and present it then in the end of the year to all other students. What is evaluated in this (group) work is research methodology, critical thinking, argumentation, information processing, ability to analyze and synthesize, team work and usage of IT. Very often we are positively surprised by creative thinking of our students (students' paper can be seen at request).
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Also, another concept that is being developed in our Department recently is volunteering. Volunteering as such is not traditionally practiced in our society, but in the last couple of years more and more students express their wish to expand the obligatory practice to volunteering in other schools or places where needed. This year, several students volunteered in the Orphanage in Mostar and also presented that work to other students.
We started some talks with the Cultural Center, implemented the first semester of practical work in TV1, and also plan to offer English courses and/or tutoring to the Orphanage in Mostar. For our master studies, we will try to find more partners in the community.

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4. 3. Students and their opinions

Our students come from different high schools, and the criterion for their enrolment is good results/grades in English and Bosnian. University procedures are carried out at all faculties and department in the same way. Ministry of Education confirms the number of students that are to be enrolled in a program (it is not clear which criteria they use in deciding on these numbers). A new challenge for us will be studying at master level, where we have to think about admission requirements for our master programs. Our programs at any level (each cycle) is specific since it is taught almost fully in English, so students from any other program should be at a certain level of language proficiency to be able to continue education in our master program/s. As we mentioned earlier, we have started working on master programs, which we will offer in the year of 2012.

Students are, generally speaking, not actively participating in decision-making processes and changes in curricula. As it has been mentioned, student representatives very often do not come to the Senate meetings, and there is no student association at our Department at the moment. This has to be improved very soon, to support work of the Department.

The University took over the obligation of students' polls organization several years ago, so we rely on that procedure when it comes to acquiring students' opinion. However, we feel that this process should be organized in more systematic way and with more information dissemination across the University. Also, it is urgent to adopt certain feedback mechanisms in which students' opinions will actually matter. In this way, collecting students' opinions has not needed weight in decision making or introduction of any change. Such a system can only make our students feel more resigned.

An alumni association is our goal for the near future, and we believe it will be possible to initiate these activities due to the fact that we already keep in touch with our students,

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though social networks and private contacts (e.g. our students helped us to start the cooperation with TV1). We also hope that very soon University level procedures on student issues will be adopted.

4.4 Students in the teaching process at the English Department


The English Department is one of five departments Humanities, and it complies with internal regulations at this Faculty. Students have two representatives in our Academic Senate but they hardly succeed in articulating their requests. Students seem to be not informed sufficiently (not very active web site of the Faculty when it comes to anything beyond exam terms and practical daily information). IT support would definitively make students better informed about their rights, possible projects and actions they can undertake, all the procedures and valid documents of the Faculty etc. We can conclude that students do not play an important role in decision making at our Department.

When it comes to the content of our program, our students have the advantage of speaking foreign language/s, which provides them with more opportunity for scholarships that include study periods at European or US universities. Approximately two to three students go abroad every year, mostly to the States, through funds of the US Government that is coordinated through the American Embassy in B&H.

As signatories of the Lisbon Convention, we are aware of our obligation of academic recognition and actually we are happy to recognize exams our students take during their stay at a foreign university. We have been trying to plan together their studies abroad in a way that they attend courses that overlap with ours so the recognition procedure is easier upon their return. (documents at requests) Unfortunately, we do not have some separate data base on mobility, and we thus lack a systematic and analytical approach to this issue. For the next period we should think about establishing an alumni body that would promote mobility. That is especially important for our students who don't have equal opportunities like their European peers when it comes to
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mobility funds, but at the same time, as students of foreign language, a study period abroad should be obligatory for improving their language skills.

So we can say that mobility is not at a satisfactory level, but students are encouraged to use the existing programs (through IR Office at the Rectorate too), and if they decide to apply, they always get our full support in terms of recommendations and recognition of exams passed during the study period abroad. Another weakness in this area is lack of an employee that could counsel students about their possibilities, ECTS transfer etc. At the moment, counseling is organized in direct communication between academic staff members and students. The Faculty of Humanities has a vice-dean for teaching and a legal department at the University level, as well as student representatives and bodies, so students can contact them with any kind of request related with the teaching process (corruption, human rights, and grievances of any kind).

Our newest activity in which we have been trying to reach our students and keep in closer touch with them is starting a Department page on internet, where, thanks to the lucky circumstance that many students use social networks, we can communicate with our students on a daily basis, answer their questions and inform and update them on news from the Department. Since July this year when we started the page, 273 students have joined it.

Thanks to the activities about this evaluation process and all other projects in which we have been learning about the Bologna principles, we agreed to try to include stronger our students in all our activities. Some of the results have been: a workshop of our teacher on stand-up comedy with our students student conference (funded by the US embassy) in which our teachers and students took part this winter semester info sessions with our students which we will continue to organize in the future, for better exchange of information

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5. 0 Infrastructure

5.1 Material aspects

The English Department is currently situated within the existing infrastructure of the Faculty of Humanities, in the Campus of DZB University. Due to historical circumstances, and the fact that Bosniak professors were expelled from the premises of the ex-University of Dzemal Bijedic of Mostar, the University started working from scratch in several buildings. For the last decade it has been eventually situated in this campus. One of the three top strategic University goals is building of new, modern infrastructure that would fit all needs of new higher-education context. Under such circumstances, in the last years, almost all the faculties have built new buildings. Faculty of Humanities is about to start construction, after the legal procedure has been finished in the last couple of months. This preliminary design envisages all elements necessary for smooth functioning of a new and modern Faculty building. In the meantime, the Faculty is still working in its old premises, which are scattered around the campus: Building 1 1 lecture theater, 4 classrooms, Building 2 two classrooms Building 3 two classrooms, 1 computer room (10 computers) Building 4 two classrooms, 1 language lab and multimedia classroom Building 5 University computer room ( 24 seats) Building 5 IT faculty 1 classroom for classes on Teaching Methodology

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Figure 1 Campus with buildings used by Humanities (a new building preliminary project being finished, construction is excpected to start this year)

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Buildings disposal

at Number computers adacemic members

of Number for computers staff students

of Number for classrooms

of Number language labs

of

10

34 + 1 studomat (a 11 public computer) in the Faculty hall

Table 2 Premises available for staff and students at Humanities, English department5 Funds for purchasing equipment are very limited. Even the projects through which we can get some equipment have strict limits about amounts that we are allowed to spend on equipment. We also get some support through low-budget projects from Ministry of Education in HN Canton. Due to the plan for (re)construction of the existing building and some new premises, the next academic year we will organize in a very limited space. Infrastructure is one of the weakest points of the faculty of Humanities. Several activities have been undertaken toward construction of a new faculty building and purchase of equipment through available projects. When it comes to the Department, we have been using international projects to purchase needed equipment and we successfully bought equipment for a new language lab, interactive board, projectors, two lap tops and expect some new equipment from other projects. Also, we are using premises of our partners (a classroom at the IT Faculty for the class on Teaching Methodology, translation booths and other translation equipment at TV1 premises, and we plan to get help from the Cultural center of King Fahd for our activities in the field of Teaching Methodology (The Center is well-equipped with language lab and a library. Also, a new, student Multimedia Center has been established in this winter semester, which helps our students with their homework assignments.
5

The staff at the Rectorate is working on the esimate of detailed infrastructure data. Thus we didn't put a precise data on m2. However, it is possible to roughly calculate it, if we take into consideration that all the classrooms have an average capacity of 25 seats, expect for the lecture hall with 170 seats.

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Also, in our main classroom, thanks to wireless internet, we organize the teaching process almost without any printing, which helps us to reduce costs, but also makes our classroom work more interesting for students. We have applied as a partner in a new Tempus project, and if it is accepted, it will help us get some more funds, equipment and expertise from our European partners.

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6. Internal Quality Assurance

6. 1. (Non) existence of QA policy

Quality assurance in the sense that European universities are familiar with is a new concept at Bosnian universities. Traditionally, there existed legal procedures that ensured fair and transparent academic processes. On the other hand, prior to the war, there was a strong interdependence between social and economic conditions and demand and educational offer at higher-education institutions. Faculties and studies were founded to meet industrial, economic and cultural needs of the community. When the war broke out, and after the country was devastated, including most of its industrial, economic, cultural and educational institutions and activities, the universities were left as islands within a ruined, postwar society. During the war, many university professors were killed, wounded or left the country, which caused a serious lack of academic staff at our universities. At the moment, universities are trying to consolidate their positions in the society. There are initiatives at cantonal level, and some at the state level, to create strategies for development of research, legislation in HE, re-building of links between universities and their environment. However, it is a time-consuming process and we cannot expect full implementation of these strategies (where they exist) in the near future. Humanities are in this situation in a specific position. There is a lot of need for activities in the field of social issues, system of values, issue of national language(s), psychological and economic adaptation in the course of European integrative processes. On the other hand, it is difficult to create and sustain a system that could ensure standards in education and application of results in the field of humanities. There are very few institutes or HE institutions dealing with humanities as a scientific field (conducting research activities), as well as funds for financing research in this area, and there is still this huge gap between universities and the society, along with a lot of politics in this field, which all prevents more serious approach to setting standards in such research.

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Some staff members of the Department have participated in almost all state-level reform projects, and one of them is one of the three experts of Council of Europe for modernization and reform of curricula. The process of such a reform that would revise university study programs as a whole has started at the University level (presentation of the three University experts to the University management organized by vice-rector for the teaching process held on 31th January 2011), and this curricula reform has been implemented at the English department as well. The Rectorate has been working on the QA procedures, and so far we have had regular student polls every semester. That applies to the English Department too. There are regulations dealing with exam organization and the teaching process in general, but basically, as already stated, all the quality is in hands of individual professors. Unfortunately, these are just some elements of quality, and what we lack is a well planned and organized QA system. So far, the University has only one employee full-time working on the quality issues. Students are at our university still rather not informed or participating poorly in the reform process. At the Faculty of Humanities, two students represent student body, but actually they rarely react or demand anything at the academic council meetings. When it comes to QA, it is still strongly depending on individual teachers and their own system of control and quality assurance, or rather their sense of quality culture and less on institutional system that could be able to ensure an efficient way of QA. As already mentioned, new Regulations have been adopted as a result of the work of a University Working Group for Accreditation (established in 2010). We expect these positive steps to be continued in the future too. One of the preconditions is adoption of the act on HE in Herzegovina-Neretva Canton, which will finally regulate all the issues and enable integration of the University. This will certainly accelerate activities already started at our University, such as development of tools /documents/regulations necessary for QA, including an integrated IT system that will help us keep all statistical data we need (missing right now due to the fact that the University has not finished the process of integration). We believe though we are on a good track to be ready for faster progress in a legally and institutionally regulated environment (which certainly has to be soon, having in mind the Act

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on HE has been waiting on adoption for years now in this Canton and that today's context in the state with an increasing number of public and private HE institutions does not leave much room for waiting; and also having in mind that some formal elements like Agency for accreditation, documents and guidelines are already existing).

The English Department is trying to get ready for the formal procedures of internal quality once they become operative. We started info sessions with our students, encouraging them to get involved as much as possible in all the processes at the Department. We believe that being transparent to our students and having a feedback from them provides more quality for all of us at the Department.

6.2. and 6.3 Measures for curriculum improvement and cooperation with alumni and the labor market

The main obstacle for us to start some more formal changes in the program is lack of classification of qualifications at the cantonal or state level. We still offer diplomas for elementary and high schools teachers and it is still not clear whether our student will be allowed to teach after the first cycle of their studies. Experiences from the neighboring countries prove they will be allowed to teach only after they finish the second/master cycle. Despite (or because of) this fact, we introduced several elements that support students orientation toward some other market needs. Students said in their questionnaires that now they have much more practical work and seminars, as compared to previous years. (data from students questionnaires details in Annex 5).

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Accessibility of TAs and Senior TAs

Exam System Transparency Teachers didactics Student teachers relations Seminar and practical work Theoretical vs. practical element in Objectivity of the grading system Evaluation system 6 no opinion 5 4 3 2 1

International harmonization of the course 0 5 10 15 20

Graph 7 Students' evaluation of ten issues (40 students involved)

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Although it is visible that we dont lack students and there is still a good response to our program, we are expecting the government bodies to finish the classification of the professions/titles we can offer, which will definitely bring more advantages to us and attract new students. The Department has started creating a database with data on possible stakeholders and employers in the community. We are now in the process of collecting data from these parties on their need for personnel with English language skills and knowledge we provide for our students. We will try to establish closer contacts with these companies and institutions in our master studies. Since our students are finishing their practical work in translation in this semester, we have prepared a questionnaire for them, but also for the representatives of TV1, in order to evaluate benefits as well as areas that can be improved in our cooperation (these questionnaires will be finished by the time of evaluation, so the team will be able to see them, if needed). We already introduced more soft/transferable skills that exist as independent courses and are often integrated in most of other courses, in order to enable our students to find jobs easier upon completion of their studies. This ensures more competences achieved at the end of the program. The English Department is at the moment understaffed, and we applied for the two teaching assistants for the next academic year. If the Ministry approves these funds, it will help us to improve our work. Activities we plan for the near future are: finding partners for practical work of our first class of master students (to start their master cycle in 2012/2013) establish an alumni association for further regular revision of the curriculum personal development (all staff members active in research even under such circumstances) introducing IT and teaching aids in the classroom (without institutional funds, we still take part in several EC projects (Tempus mainly) introducing practical work of students and making links with stake-holders from the community and the market
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creating internal data base on potential partners (we already collected some data)

improving communication and flow of information toward and from our students careful planning of the future activities (master programs, forming alumni association in order to gain feedback on the quality of our study program etc.)

7.0 Results (Criterion 7)

Our students have been writing their final papers without real practical insight into their future profession. With the changes we have introduced in the last couple of years, we wanted to provide them with more practical information, knowledge and skills. It is to be seen how this will affect the quality of their final papers and their performance in the future profession in the end. We are very interested in continuance of all practical activities (teaching methodology and translation) and finding new partners from our future activities, especially having in mind our master program. We find exchange of information with our students really useful, since we get more realistic insight in our work. For example, from the poll we have been conducting with our graduate students (who studied according to the old, non-revised program), we concluded from their responses that we made a good move by introducing more practical skills in our classes in recent years. These new elements of our curriculum (treating equally language skills: comprehension, speaking, reading and writing, together with additional practical translation classes) have been exactly some of the points our alumni missed during their studies. Many of our students found jobs in schools but also in other institutions and companies. We have been collecting this data and plan to use it when planning our future activities.
As mentioned earlier, internationalization is one of the key aspects of our program, in several aspects: 53

international quality of the very study program ( a foreign language as such) international projects and activities in which our staff members are involved foreign lecturers working at our Department since its foundation international exchange programs and activities of our students

We mentioned some of these activities earlier in this Report, and here it might be interesting to stress that this year again we will have a third-year student in the US, through a program coordinated by the US Embassy in BiH. The US embassy has been providing funds for our foreign lecturers too (one per year), but this year, due to limited funds we cannot rely on that support. That is why we already announced a call for engagement of two foreign lecturers (foreign meaning English native speakers), since we understand that this international component has to be offered to our students for the sake of quality and building of their language skills. Eventually, we were lucky to start cooperation with lecturer Alma Piric, who is an ex ELF, living att the moment in Bosnia-Herzegovina (contact with the lecturer made during the cooperation of all English departments in B&H, in the CoE project). Some info on our alumni students can be seen in the Annex 6, and other information at request. Statistical data on students is still not fully ready, due to the fact we mentioned earlier, that the reform processes at the University level were interrupted since the process of integration has not finished (because the act on HE in the Canton is still pending).

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8.0 Future activities

Downside legal framework

Measures/planned activiites

Waiting the legislation issues to be solved on the state level, the English Department is trying to improve elements that can be changed, such as quality of teaching, employability factor in the curriculum, international cooperation etc., in order to be ready when Bologna legislation is finally adopted. orientation toward market stronger practical element in our curriculum (activity: new cooperation agreement with TV1 signed in October, a new one with the Cultural center under negotiation) more soft/transferable skills that exist as independent courses and are often integrated in most of other courses, in order to enable our students to find jobs easier upon completion of their studies. This ensures more competences achieved at the end of the program. (activity: through CCML Tempus project we are checking how well we did our first set of competences)

inadequate infrastructure no funds for purchase of teaching aids

The construction to start in 2012 Participation in projects (Tempus and other international projects, new applications)

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reduced opportunities for travelling and international cooperation, due to nonexistence of appropriate state or canton-level funds or mobility networks.

continue with individual efforts further internationalization we offer our program through the University -level cooperation projects as a department that can offer attractive studies to international students (we already sent information about our Department through the University IR Office) our classes are taught in English all core courses (except for the courses organized for more departments) participation in international projects

no strong links with the community , human values in the society poorly respected

strategy for development and profiling (we have to wait for strategic documents at the Faculty, but that fact does not prevents us from having a clear idea and plan for future activities)

we lack a well planned and organized QA system

1. work toward quality culture as the only possible (although more challenging) process at the moment through encouraging individual progress, education, learning, international participation of each academic staff member. 2. using available internet options like fb or software for easier student polls. At the moment, internet offers opportunity to reach our students easier and get their opinions on the current issues, and we will also rely more on our cooperation with IT Faculty 3. we will continue working on contacting our students and graduates in order to create alumni association 4. development of information system (with support from IT faculty) that will enable easier distribution of information to students, student polls, exchange of opinions and ideas among students and between teaching staff and students, aiming at quality improvement

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5. promotion of QA practice on Facultys web site Our goals in QA quality curriculum, quality teaching, students involved in the work of Department, links with society, quality culture of teachers and students

Establishment of Faculty student association should be encouraged and student representatives should regularly be invited to Faculty Council meetings

usage of information technologies and dissemination of information among students.

should be intensified through further cooperation and joint projects with IT Faculty development of information system (with support from IT faculty) that will enable easier distribution of information to and among students

second cycle

Master studies we will try to gain information about students' interest through communication to external focus groups and interviewing our senior students

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Annex 1 Students 2007/2008 1st year 2nd year 3rd year 4th year Total 87 72 39 14 212 2008/2009 68 74 85 27 254 2009/2010 79 35 104 76 294 2010/2011 65 39 26 112 243 2011/2012 50 enroled

Table 2 Students by study years

2006/2007 40

2007/2008 47

2008/2009 115

2009/2010 18

2010/2011

Table 3. Graduated students in the last four years

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Annex 2 Teaching staff

Years

Full professor

Associate professor

Assistant professor

Senior assistants and assistant

Research assistant

Others Total of academic staff

Nonacade mic staff

2010

1 ( +2)*

0 (+1)

2 (+1)

8 (+1)**

1***

12 (+ 4)

2009 2008 2012

1 ( +3) 1 (+3) 1 (+3)

0 0 0

0 (+2) 0 (+2) 6

6 5 5

1 1 1

8 (+5) 7 (+5) 7 (+5)

Table 4. Staff academic and non-academic

*data in the brackets represents teachers coming from other faculties/universities. 1. ** a procedure for academic promotion of another TA has started in January 2011 (represented with (+1). 2. *** An English Language Fellow has been teaching at the Department since its foundation (Program sponsored through the US Embassy) 3. Note: All departments within Humanities have a central student record office at the faculty level, and legal and financial offices at the University level.

Years 2010 2009

Full time teaching staff 12 8

Part-time teaching staff 4 5

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2008

Table 5 - Full time versus part time academic staff ratio Note: In Tables 4 and 5, professors coming from other departments of the Faculty of Humanities are not shown (teaching some common courses such as Bosnian, History, and who are not employees of the English Department)

Graph 6 Full time vs. part time teaching staff ratio

Name
Biakid Iris Dizdar Nerin Diho Aida Fejzid Adi Maslo Adi Memid Iris Palikuda Amila Raljevid Selma pago Demal

Year of birth
1976. 1981. 1981. 1974. 1986. 1976. 1985. 1977. 1977.

Sex
F M F M M F F F M

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pago-Dumurija Edina Tanovid Mustafa

1975. 1934.

F M

Table 6 List of academic staff members (alphabetic order)

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Annex 3. - (International) Projects and activities of the academic staff members Adi Fejzic International Conferences/Roundtables 2010 The Status and Perspectives of the Bologna Process in the Federation of Bosnia and Hercegovina, Mostar 2010 2010 2006 2003 Sarajevski filoloki susreti (The Philological Meetings of Sarajevo) Ilida BIMEP, Conferencs on phonetics and phonology, Belgrade, Serbia First Congress of BIH Scholars, Sarajevo Faculty of Electrical Engineering, European Observatory for Science and Culture, Ljubljana, Slovenia, 2001 International Philosophic Conference, Reggio di Emilia, Italija

Projects 2001-2004 2000-2004 2003 BOSHMAN (Education management research & training project for BiH) TEMPUS, Barcelona & London Apprentice Assemblies, Sarajevo, Tuzla, Fruska Gora, Serbia

Foreign Stays 2004-2005 Junior Faculty Development Program, USA

Dzemal Spago Foreign Stays 2011 (January May) Junior Faculty Development Program, USA

Edina Spago-Cumurija
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International Conferences/Roundtables 2010 Sarajevski filoloki susreti (Sarajevo Philological Meetings ) sarajevo

2009 Scientific Symposium, Institute of Linguistics, University of Karl-Franzen, Graz, Austria, Syntactic differences between Bosnian and Croatian courses for foreigners, Scientific project on Differences among Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian Languages

2008

Scientific Symposium, Institute of Linguistics, University of Graz, Graz, Austria, Analysis of translations of Dayton Peace Agreement, Scientific project on Differences among Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian Languages

2002-2008

Tempus Projects on Bologna Reform in B&H, Universities in Germany (Paderborn, Osnabruck, Konstanz), Italy (Rim-Uni Tor Vergata), Spain (Granada), Serbia (Kragujevac), BiH (Sarajevo, Banja Luka, Zenica, Tuzla)

2007

Forum Bosnia, Roundtable, The Language of Hatred on B&H Universities, Mostar, B&H

2006

Cooperation of Universities from the Mediterranean Region, Granada, Spain Language issues in Bosnia&Herzegovina

2005

CEF Conference Mostar, Faculty of Humanities, organization of the conference and a presentation on CEF (Common European Framework for foreign language learning and teaching) at BH universities

2004

English Language Fellow Regional Conference, Teaching Methodology at faculty of Humanities in Mostar, Budapest, Hungary

Projects 20022004 Foreign Stays Tempus Project International Leadership Project, USA

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2007

Within Doctoral Studies, stay at University of Karl-Franz, Graz, Austria, funded by WUS Austria

2004

International Leadership Project, a study trip to the US, funded by the US Government

Iris Memi Projects 2006 Tempus project SCM-C010B06, "IT qualification framework for higher education in Bosnia and Herzegovina" 2004 2001 Tempus project UM_JEP-19015, "Quality assurance through accreditation" Tempus project JEP 16110, "Curriculum development for three cycles of IT studies with internationally recognized diplomas"

Selma Raljevic International Conferences/Roundtables 2010 Tracing Tristan and Isolde to the 20th Century, The 3rd International Conference entitled "The Synthesis of Fictional and Factional in Literature and Art, University of Kazan, Russia, May, 2010. 2010 Silence of the Other in E. Annie Proulxs Brokeback Mountain, The 1 st

International Conference entitled Re-Thinking Humanities and Social Sciences The Issue of the (Post)Other: Postmodernism and the Other, University of Zadar, Croatia, September, 2010. 2003 Apokalipticna putanja broda pod nazivom TO, graditelja Alije Isakovica, A

Roundtable Discussion The Poetics of Contemporary Bosniak Drama, BZK Preporod Sarajevo, December, 2003. Projects

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2010

Took part in the event organized by The U.S. Embassy in Sarajevo to commemorate International Education Week

2009

Organization of the faculty lecture in recognition of Black History Month in cooperation with The U.S. Embassy in Sarajevo

2007

Organization of the faculty lecture Doris Lessing: A Female Quest for SelfKnowledge in cooperation with The American Corner of Mostar

2007

Organization of the faculty lecture Womens voices in cooperation with The American Corner of Mostar

2007

Organization of the faculty lecture Black History Night in cooperation with The American Corner of Mostar

Foreign Stays 2009 2009 SUSI on Contemporary American Literature in the USA (six weeks) IT Learning Course in Egypt (two weeks)

Aida Dziho
Publications:

The Novel All the Pretty Horses in the Light of Postmodern Theory Modernism and Its Echoes Mustafa Tanovid Grammar of English Language (short review)

Iris Bicakcic International Conferences/Roundtables 2011 Identities under Construction: Cultural Gateways and Walls in Contemporary British Literature, European Association for Commonwealth Literature and Language Studies Conference, Bogazici University, Istanbul, Turkey
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2010

Representation of Diasporic Identities in Black British Literature: the First Generation vs. the Second Generation, Contested Communities:

Communication, Narration, Imagination, Association for the Study of the New Literatures in English, Bayreuth University Foreign Stays 2004-2009 2002-2004 Doctoral studies, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria MA studies, Karl-Franzens University, Graz, Austria

Mustafa Tanovic System of exercise in foreign language teaching Convention of Applied Linguistics, Sarajevo Foreign Stays Columbia University, the US
New School for Social Research, NY

Amila Palikuca Foreign Stays 2010 Greater Europe for Greater solidarity Youth Exchange, Youth in Action Programme, Madrid, Spain 2009 2007 International Summer School, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway Intensive Course of Spanish Language, University of Granada, Spain

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Annex 4 - Theses Magistar theses Name Edina pago Thesis title Semantic and date pragmatic Defended Scientific field Linguistics

Dumurija

transposition of the work by 26 June 2007. Mesa Selimovic in English translation

Adi Fejzid

Forms

of

non-standard Defended

Linguistics

English in the work by Irwin 20 July 2007 Welsh Selma Raljevid Anglo-American reactions to Defended the modern world in the 4 April 2009 Dubliners by James Joyce and Winesburg, Ohio by Literature

Sherwood Anderson Demal pago Realization of a command as Defended a speech act in contemporary 15 June2009 English Aida Diho Modernist literature approach and feminist vision in the work Ms Dalloway and A Room on Ones Own by Virginia Wolf Nerin Dizdar Working on his magister Defended in July Linguistics thesis Iris Memid 2011 Defended 31 August 2009 Literature Literature

Working on her magister Expected defense Applied thesis in the fall Linguistics

semester of 2011 Adi Maslo Enrolled studies in his Magister started 2010 Linguistics

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Amila Palikuda

Pursuing studies

her

Magister started 2008

Literature

69

Doctoral theses

Iri Bicakcic

Trans)formation cultural through violence

of 2009

Literature

identity Wien political in

postcolonial literature Edina pago-Dumurija Linguistic element of Defended the CNN advertising 07.05.2010 code as a reflection of the entire Linguistics

communication code of the American

society Adi Fejzic Language of British to comedy be

defended in the winter semester 2011/2012

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Annex 5 Some of the questions from the (current) student questionnaires (40 students evaluated) Grade (1 being the lowest grade) International harmonization of the course 3 8 7 2 2 1 2 3 4 5 6 no opinion

Evaluation system

15

10

Objectivity of the 0 grading system Theoretical vs. practical element in courses Seminar and practical work Student teachers relations Teachers didactics Exam System Transparency Accessibility of Professors and Asst. Professors Accessibility of TAs and Senior 3 5 1 2 2 1 2

14

13

15

12

14

17

13

20

18

18

11

15

71

TAs

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Annex 6. Results of a poll conducted with alumni of the English language department
The English language conducted an online poll among its alumni and received the following results (this poll is still open): 71.4% of the alumni work in their field of expertise, out of which: o 65% work as teachers in elementary of high schools o 30% work as translators o 5% run their own business
14 12 10 8 6 4 2 0 Elementary and High Schools As Translators Run Own Business

Alumni that Work in Their Field of Expertise

Regarding class quality the respondents replied as follows: o 0% - bad o 10.7% - satisfying o 39.3% - good o 25% - very good o 25% 12 10 8 6 4 2 0 bad satisfying good very good excellent alumni marks on class quality

excellent

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Asked to comment on what was the most useful and what the curriculum lacked, the alumni reported that exercises regarding grammar were the most useful whereas they lacked English language speaking skills.

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