ICT STUDIES IN ENGLISH – A COMPARISON OF RESEARCH RESULTS IN TWO COUNTRIES

Both Kazakhstan and Poland implement programmes aimed at internationalisation of higher education. The basic element of these programmes are curricula of classes conducted in English. These measures apply to all study fields, but are particularly important for the area of ICT. Increasing globalisation of the labour market in the area of ICT creates for graduates the possibility of working for employers around the world. Besides professional skills, a condition of obtaining such work is fluency in English, including technical language and very often even the specific jargon of ICT.

Work on the opening of studies in English are preceded by a degree of market research, i.e. establishing the level of student interest in this form of study. Such tests among first degree students of Computer Science at the Lublin University of Technology (Lublin, Poland) were carried out in May 2016. Students were surveyed for their potential intentions in relation to the issue of studying at second degree or postgraduate (MSc) level in English, students’ self-evaluation of their proficiency in English, their motivations for and expectations from such studies. The survey also addressed the reasons for the lack of desire to study in English. A similar survey according to the same methodology was conducted in November 2016 at the Khoja Akhmet-Yassawi International Kazak-Turkish University (in the city of Turkistan, Kazakhstan).

The article presents the surveys’ research methodology, their implementation and a comparative analysis of the research results.