Students' Attitudes toward EMI: Using Chung Hua University as an Example

It has been a trend that more and more content teachers in universities of Taiwan are using or are going to use English as a medium of instruction (EMI) for courses that are not related to language learning. The telephone interviews we have conducted indicated that most universities in Taiwan offered professors nominal financial incentives to make up extra time they will spend, but did not draw up clear guidelines for EMI. Considering students’ English proficiency, the EMI language policy is particularly limited to graduate courses. However, some universities also applied it to undergraduate courses. A questionnaire survey was conducted at Chung Hua University to investigate students’ attitudes towards EMI. The results showed that most students, even those who confessed that they did not have a good command of English, thought that EMI was a helpful language policy. The findings also suggested that most students were aware that learning English by using it in the classroom was one of the most effective ways to improve their English. The paper also discusses the feasibility of EMI in an EFL environment in Taiwan and compares the EMI language policy with that in some other ESL/EFL areas such as Hong Kong and Malaysia. Finally, the paper concludes with how English teachers in universities of Taiwan should face a possible full-scale EMI language policy in the future and what kinds of roles we can play once EMI is fully implemented.