A Study Of Universities' Foreign Language Planning For The Purpose Of Business In The Context Of The Belt And Road Initiative

With the steady progress of the Belt and Road Initiative,the demand for business foreign language talents is increasing in enterprises going global.Many colleges and universities have taken the opportunity to set up more non-English business foreign language majors.Previous studies have concentrated on the curriculum design of business English while overlooking the aspects of teacher selection,admission requirements and graduation evaluation.Under this circumstance,this study selected business English and other business foreign language majors as the research subjects and conducted multifaceted research.This study,based on Kaplan and Baldauf's(1997,2003)micro language planning and language-in-education theory,adopted online survey method to investigate foreign language planning for business purpose in six colleges.The study also drew on Hutchinson and Waters'(1987)target needs analysis model and conducted an internet sampling survey and semistructured interviews with employers,through which the target needs of the demand side for business foreign language talents were obtained.Primarily,the current study tried to figure out: 1)the status quo of foreign language planning for business purpose in Chinese universities;2)the needs of the employers on business foreign language talents.The results of the study are as follows: In terms of access policy,the enrollment of the investigated business foreign language majors is on the rising trend.Yet,the scale of enrollment of different business foreign language majors still varies.In addition,some enrollment quotas are purposely distributed to students with a certain level of proficiency in foreign languages.Regarding personnel policy,the de facto situation is that some business foreign language majors are confronted with serious deficiencies in foreign teachers and qualified teachers with foreign language proficiency and business knowledge.With regard to the curriculum policy,there exists the phenomenon that business is overestimated while foreign languages are underestimated.Cultural courses compatible with language courses are overlooked.Except for business English,most business foreign language majors are not capable to open business courses with foreign language serving as the medium of instruction.Moreover,colleges still have a great reliance on overseas partner schools in teaching integrated business foreign language courses.With respect to evaluation policy,various colleges still center on the examination results,certificate acquisition and paper submission,and the emphasis on practical teaching and internship is insufficient.The target needs analysis shows that business foreign language talents are coveted in the market.Generally speaking,the job duties of business foreign language talents mainly include: daily communication with overseas clients,overseas customer maintenance,interpretation and translation,business correspondence writing and sales order processing.Business foreign language talents are expected to have the corresponding language certificate,possess excellent language ability(speaking,speaking,reading and writing ability),interpretation and translation ability,work or internship experience,business knowledge and cross-culture communication ability.Based on the above research findings,suggestions for foreign language planning for business purpose are as follows: appropriately expanding the scale of enrollment;clarifying the teaching objectives,formulating corresponding syllabus;designing scientific curriculum according to teaching objective and target needs,opening business courses in which foreign languages are the medium of instruction;reinforcing personnel policy formulation,recruiting and training teachers with language skills and business background;rationally formulating evaluation policies,using situational teaching and other methods to strengthen practical teaching.