School of Foreign Languages

Hello, my name is Nilgün İNER. I am the assistant director of Izmir Bakırçay University School of Foreign Languages.Our School of Foreign Languages provides education in the field of preparatory education. We carry out our activities both for our students who have compulsory preparatory class and for our students who study optional preparatory class. In the School of Foreign Languages, primarily preparatory class education is provided. Our students studying the compulsory preparatory class are currently enrolled in the departments of Management Information Systems and International Trade and Business Administration. Our students have two chances. One is to certify their language proficiency according to the equivalencies specified by YÖK (Council of Higher Education). Another one is to take an exemption exam at the beginning of the academic year before starting the preparatory class. Students need to be successful in this exam. Or, if they have not documented their language proficiency as a result of these exams, we expect our students to study language in the preparatory class for a maximum of two years. In order for our students to study optional preparatory education, they need to make an application. We accept 10% of each department on an application basis. In this way, our optional students and compulsory preparatory students study in mixed classes.In our School of Foreign Languages, we continue our activities in compulsory English courses in all faculties and vocational schools, as well as in vocational and technical English courses of faculties. We also have activities in other language exams to be held within Izmir Bakırçay University when necessary. Although the duration of our preparatory education is very limited, it is a full year of education. We start our students in two groups according to their level. If they have not passed the exemption exam at the beginning of the year, they take placement exams at the beginning of the year. As a result of this exam, we place our students at the basic or intermediate level. Our students have the chance to start from A1 or A2 in these classes. By the end of the year, we expect all of them to finish their preparatory education at B2 level. Our academic calendar is the same as the university. However, there are some differences in terms of assessment and evaluation. On the one hand, the fall and spring semesters are not considered separately, but as a collective year. We think we have a very fast-paced, intense but fun preparatory education.In general, we offer basic language training and language skills courses. Basic language education is a more intensive course in terms of class hours. It includes a program that integrates the 4 basic language skills of reading, writing, listening and speaking into grammar and vocabulary lessons. In addition, we have a language skills course that focuses on the language skills of our students, especially reading and writing skills. In both groups of courses, we expect our students to achieve language skills in the classical sense as we know it, and we also aim for them to achieve what we call 21st century skills, soft skills. Our focus in these skill-based courses is to make the processes easier when preparing their homework or presentations in their academic lives, and to ensure that they acquire enough language to manage the processes.
We have a computer laboratory and a library in our school building. Our school is not on the main campus, but we are quite close to the main campus. We have a cafeteria, we have state-of-the-art smart boards and spacious classrooms. Apart from that, we continue to use the conference halls and movie theaters on the main campus for extra-curricular activities, such as karaoke parties or drama club activities.The organizations were suspended during the pandemic period. As of last year, they started to be planned and executed again. We continue to take part in organizations that concern our fields of activity. For example, this year we will be the host of the Trivia Quiz Night event between the preparatory classes of Izmir universities in the 2022 - 2023 academic year. We try to take part in organizations like this as much as we can.One of the most difficult things for our students is our writing skills courses. The reasons for our students' difficulties in writing skills are generally seen by them as their English language proficiency, but in fact, we have an assessment and evaluation system that not only focuses on their final success, but also measures their success in the process, and allows us to give them feedback on these issues, in order for our students to be more successful in writing skills, in fact, I can say this in all language skills areas. We give feedback to our students after each assessment activity. We support them in preparing action plans to improve on these issues. At the same time, we have digital platforms that can enable and encourage them to work individually in all subject areas. We try to help them succeed by using all of them together.Izmir Bakırçay University has many facilities that students can benefit from with its strong academic staff and rich library on its main campus. In terms of barrier-free Bakırçay and smart campus, our students can benefit from these facilities at a high rate.At Izmir Bakırçay University, students who are placed in departments where the medium of instruction is 100% English have to study in the preparatory class or they have to document their English language proficiency. There is a general prejudice about preparatory education. Generally, students think that preparatory education is a waste of time that should be skipped as soon as possible, but it is not. On the contrary, having a preparatory education is a step that enables our students to take faster steps in academic and professional life and to produce more qualified work. We recommend that our students take preparatory education and pass their departments by making sure of their English language proficiency. We wish success to the students who will take the university exam. We welcome everyone to Izmir Bakırçay University.