This study explores the effectiveness of English as a medium of instruction (EMI) in the Arabian/Persian Gulf, with special focus on the situation in the United Arab Emirates. The study, undertaken at six universities located in major cities of Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Al Ain, Sharjah, Ajman, and Ras Al Khaimah, examines students' and teachers'…

Using Jamaica, a former British colony where Jamaican Creole (JC) is the mass vernacular but Standard Jamaican English is the official language, as an illustrative case, this critical ethnographic study in three Jamaican schools examines the theoretical and practical challenges of language education policy (LEP) development and implementation in…

With shifts in demographics leading to increasingly diverse student populations, and pressures from state educational accountability offices to streamline budgets and improve test scores, teachers at the secondary level are increasingly challenged to support English learners new to US schools. Teachers, often with minimal understanding of second…

This article describes and analyzes how rural Nicaraguan teachers and NGO leaders are working with a US university-based team to develop a locally responsive, critical, and inquiry-based approach to the Ministry of Education requirement for English in secondary school. This requirement has placed a new and challenging expectation upon rural…

Since the 1990s, universities in South Korea have participated in an aggressive movement to globalize their institutions through the medium of English by hiring English-proficient faculty. To attain tenure, faculty must publish in international indexed journals (IIJs), which results in a de facto language policy of publishing in English because…

This article examines the evolution of national research policy in China over the past three decades and its recent shift in emphasis from "import" to "import-export" oriented internationalization. Based on a policy review and interviews with three groups of academics--six journal editors in the humanities and social sciences,…

This article ethnographically analyzes the everyday negotiations of a language policy at a private religious educational institution whose explicit educative mission is the transmission of religious beliefs, values, and practices. Specifically, it explores a Hebrew-only language policy at a Jewish day school located in New York City, and focuses…

Discontinuities are often found between top-down language education policies and local language policy enactments, as de facto language policymaking results from stakeholders' negotiation and interpretation of policy mandates. Teachers occupy a particular role in the execution of language education policies, as they are the "final arbiters" of…

In an effort to reverse the reading crisis purported to plague public education, schools and districts are mandating prescriptive reading programs and teacher-centered instructional practices in hopes of improving the academic achievement of minority students, including English learners (ELs). The wide-spread implementation of these programs in…

A tension exists for teachers in Texas bilingual third and fifth grade classrooms between state and local bilingual education policy, which encourages them to transition students gradually from Spanish into English instruction while providing bilingual support; and state and federal accountability policy, which requires them to choose a single…

"No Child Left Behind" (NCLB, 2001) fails to recognize English as a second language (ESL) as a specialized academic discipline in which teachers should be "highly qualified." In this paper we examine the impact of this policy failure on the practice of teachers of K-12 English language learners (ELLs), particularly in the context of reading…