PetrSU in SMARTI International Project
PetrSU participated in the annual meeting of the SMARTI international project managers. This project is implemented under the EU Erasmus+ program. The international consortium of the SMARTI project held a hybrid meeting in Yerevan and Goris (Armenia) and convened the project partners - universities and education quality assessment organizations from Germany, the United Kingdom, Portugal, Latvia, Armenia and Russia.
Aleksei Kupriakhin on behalf of PetrSU officially presented the activities results of the university's project team within the framework of the first work package entitled "Preparation" at the hybrid meeting of representatives of the SMARTI international consortium in Goris.
This work package included a comprehensive study in the field of English as a medium of instruction (EMI) towards the realities of Russia’s higher education. The study touched upon both statistical indicators related to the number and variety of educational programs in English at Russian universities, and surveys of students, teachers, and administrative staff, which made it possible to shed light on the quality problems of English-language training programs at Russian universities.
Thanks to the PetrSU project team’s work, the international consortium got access to updated and accurate information, in accordance with which the entire further course of activities within the project will be adjusted. In particular, it included the opening and subsequent functioning of EMI centers at partner universities, created to train and retrain lecturers who want to teach their non-linguistic disciplines in English. One of these centers will be opened at the premises of the Institute of Foreign Languages (PetrSU). At the moment, the project team is coordinating the issues of staffing the center, purchase and delivery of equipment.
Based on the research conducted under the leadership of PetrSU, the international consortium will prepare a collective monograph on the English language as a teaching environment in Russia. After this publication, all statistical data will be posted with opened assess on the project’s official websites.