English-Medium Instruction at a Dutch University: Challenges and Pitfalls

Robert Wilkinson

Introduction

English-medium instruction (EMI) has become commonplace in many institutes of higher education in countries where English is not the native language. This is a contemporary feature of the higher education space in Europe and elsewhere. Almost every institute seems compelled to offer programmes through English, whether at postgraduate level (Master's) or at undergraduate level (Bachelor's). The expansion of EMI has been driven by economic, social and political forces, and sometimes even educational. The advent of ranking organisations has accelerated the trend, by establishing criteria against which institutions can be compared. Consistently in such rankings, universities from the United States and Britain fill the top places. Between institutions, the rankings have generated an atmosphere of competitiveness between institutions, which may have been only negligible in the past. Senior administrators pay great attention to the rankings, whatever the basis for the criteria, and note with pleasure or anxiety the relative ranks of their own institute and those with which they most wish to compare, i.e. their assumed competitors. The administrators wish to see their institution attain and maintain a relatively high place in the rankings. To do so, they seem subject to an unconscionable desire to emulate the top-ranking universities by doing what those universities do well, and doing it better if at all possible, and this seems to entail doing it in English. Academic research is an important part of the rankings, and thus it needs to be read and rated in the best possible journals for the widest international readership; hence research too has to be published primarily in English.

Students, together with the staff, are the fundamental core of a university. Without students there is no university. Universities want the best students. Sourcing excellent students, however, can no longer be limited to the first language (L1) area: in many cases there are simply not enough excellent domestic students to meet the wishes of the national universities. The institutions are therefore striving to attract such students from other countries, and in many cases that will mean enticing students through EMI programmes. However, it may be questioned whether this trend towards increasing EMI is good, and if so, who actually benefits.

On the other hand, it is worth considering whether there are 'losers', and if so, what they are losing. In one perspective, higher education may be seen as fixed: there is a fixed number of institutions and fixed number of students. Thus what one institution gains, another loses. However, this treats education as a zero-sum game, in which for every winner, there is a loser. Yet, the size of education can itself get bigger. It is non-zero-sum in that there can be more 'winners' than 'losers'.

This chapter then looks at the challenges EMI poses and what advantages or disadvantages it conveys. The example of one Dutch university, Maastricht, is used by way of illustration. The paper is organised as follows. Section 2 sketches the origins of EMI at Maastricht University. It is a story that unfolded gradually over nearly two decades, and I was a key player in the events. Section 3 looks more broadly at the reasons for introducing EMI, with specific focus on European institutions. Section 4 examines selected consequences of EMI for the society, the students and the institution. Section 5 concludes with reflections on the implications for the future student, the future of higher educational institutions, and cultures and languages other than English (see also Li in this volume).

The Early Story of the English-Medium Instruction at Maastricht University

In the mid-1980s a small Dutch university decided to open a first-degree programme in International Management. After an initial phase in Dutch, the programme would be taught mainly in English with special components delivered in French and German. The four-year programme led to a 'doctorandus' degree in economics, the equivalent of today's master's degree. The initial intake of students was small, yet almost doubled every year so that by the third year over a hundred students were following the programme at Maastricht University.

Prior to the start of the programme, concern was expressed about the ability of Dutch students to follow programmes in English, in particular whether students with high-school English would be adequately equipped. It was decided to test all potential applicants to the programme. This was possible as it did not concern entry to the university but to a specific 'track' within the economics curriculum. Under Dutch law entry tests other than the school-leaving diploma were not permitted. Thus, during the initial Dutch phase almost all students interested in following the International Management 'track' in English took a voluntary screening test in English. Students with low scores were advised not to join the track. Psychometric analysis of the test showed good discrimination for the total score and the writing score, but not so for the scores on the other sub-components (reading comprehension, syntax, punctuation) (Foster...