Abstract:

There is an increased awareness of the importance of internationalisation (globalisation) in the higher education sector. The aim of this article was to analyse the students’ participation in this international co-operation and the impact on their professional development. Students’ active participation represented an important goal. Mostly Russian, but also a limited number of Scandinavian students (BSc, MSc and PhD), participated in workshops, seminars and practical activities organized in Russia and Norway in connection with scheduled project meetings. Students could attend lectures given by Russian and Scandinavian academics and were encouraged to present their work in dedicated students' sessions. They also had the opportunity to visit private aquacultural companies in Russia and take part in some practical training along with their tutors.

The purpose of the educational part of the project was to encourage students to solve the problems posed by technological specialties with the help of their already existing knowledge and skills, as well as obtaining new knowledge and skills whilst improving their knowledge of the English language. The aim of our research was to monitor the students’ active position in connection with their academic progress in the course of studying English. The concept of Web 2.0 provided the ability to share knowledge not only from teacher to students, but also between their peers as well as from students to the teacher. It formed a high-quality educational environment with the possibility of interactive multilateral communication.

We compared the forms of participation of students taking part in the international project (experimental group) and those from an inner university project (control group). To test it, we analysed the results of the students’ training in two groups from their 1st and 2nd years of education – a control group (45 students) and an experimental group (46 students). Some students found themselves studying at the front line of current research, greatly adding to their future potential, and providing additional kudos to the institute itself. The other students, despite their expected growth of knowledge and language and specialty, were not ready to take part in the project work. Even recognizing that the project was interesting, they did not try hard to contribute to the group, remaining unmotivated throughout.

The results confirmed that those students who undertook to work actively found that the project contributed to the development of their foreign-language communicative competence. Additionally, their experience helped to develop professional competence even in students who had just started the main programme of study.

Keywords:

International cooperation, international project, cooperation, active position, foreign-language communicative competence.