Main points of undergraduate education……
Main points of undergraduate education and major construction inForeign Languages College
1. Guiding ideology
We need to earnestly implement <the Twelve-fifthPlan of Education in Shanghai Maritime University >, support the universityto achieve its overall objective of constructing the world high-level maritime university.Consulting the development objectives related to undergraduate education andspecialty construction those are set by <Development Planning (2013-2020) ofDiscipline and Major Construction of College of Foreign Languages in ShanghaiMaritime University>, we need to find and resolve problems existed inundergraduate education, curricula construction, major construction andteaching laboratory construction. Thus to accomplish the “Assessment Indicatorsof College of Foreign Languages from 2013 to 2015 Academic Years” issued by theuniversity and to promote our undergraduate education and major construction.
2. College English Teaching
1). Current situation
1.1 Operates teaching-research office in foundation course of college English(first year), teaching-research office in development course of college English(second year) and special teaching research office in college English courses(aquatic majors) the three academic units, mainly responsible for all thecollege English teaching.
1.2 Under the leading of Academic Affairs Division, the reforms ofgraded teaching, distributary teaching and small-class teaching have alreadybeen implemented.
1.3 The scores of CET/6 of our students are dozens of percentage pointshigher than the national average grades.
2).Main problems
2.1 On accountof the teaching present situation of college English and students’ demands, thereform is imperative, but the goal of reform is not explicit. At present, some reformmeasures have got some achievements, but due to lack of systematicness, someproblems are exposed. For instance, the relevant test reforms have not keep upwith the teaching reforms, some top students after grade teaching and studentsof characteristic courses after distributary are complaining about it. Morestudents choose to quit the characteristic courses.
2.2 Teachingmaterials and teaching methods have not changed for many years.
2.3 Therelevant programs of key curriculums, high-quality curriculums and excellentteaching teams are almost few. Scientific research in college English teachingis weak.
2.4 The Englishlevel of students when they first enter college is uneven. Students from Midwestare poor in English listening and speaking. Students are lack of learningmotivation to learn English.
3. Major measures
1).The teaching of college English, especially the teaching for aquatic majors,need to reflect university’s mainstream majors, namely, English teaching shallpossess maritime characteristics. Hold “College English teaching and research salon”regularly. The salon will concretely undertaken by “teaching and research teamof College English (English of maritime characteristics)” and the related workswill be practicable in the second half of 2014.
Responsible persons: HeShaobin,RongYongchang, LuZhongfei.
2). Sincethe second half of 2014, college will set up programs to train the teaching andresearch teams of college English and start to build “Teaching and ResearchCenter of College English (English of maritime characteristics)”. In the secondhalf of 2014 or 2015, this center shall accomplish the application for“Teachingand Research Platform” project library. Main contents of the project libraryinclude: examination database of college English, English materials of maritimecharacteristics, characteristic course development, maritime English database,talent team cultivation, etc. It shall also create conditions to develop MOOCS (MassiveOpen Online Course), the college English course with maritime characteristics. Theaim is to improve students’ learning interest and learning effect as well asexpand the social influence of our maritime English courses.
Responsible persons: HeShaobin, etc.
3). Under the arrangement of AcademicAffair Division, gradually realize the separation of teaching and testing topromote teaching quality and teaching effects of college English (Specific timeof being carried out shall be in accordance with the arrangement of AcademicAffair Division).
4). On the basis of the existing college-levelkey curriculums (Gengyan, TongHelong, 2012), make preparation for applicationfor key curriculum to Shanghai Educational Committee. The first applicationshall be accomplished during from 2015 to 2016.
5). To support the university’s requirementfor promotion undergraduates’ oral English, since the second half of 2014, thepilot university-wide English Oral Contest will be hosted by our college.
Responsible persons: HeShaobin,QianMinfang, LuZhongfei, RongYongchang, TongHelong
2. English/Japanese major construction
1). Currentsituation
Thefour undergraduate majors are English (shipping, translation), business English,Japanese with four specialized directions. The enrollments every year arearound 230.
2). Mainproblems
2.1 The goals of each major’s development are unclear. Majorconstruction relies simply on college’s teaching arrangement and is lack ofinitiative.
2.2 With respect to embodying college’s features in major construction,the college hasn’t got a clear thinking. The problem of the mismatching ofmajor construction to talent market demands stands out (Undergraduates’employments are not all professional counterparts.)
2.3 In accordance to <2013-2020 Development Planning of the College’sSubject and Major Construction>, endeavor has been made to constructundergraduate major of translation in 2014, but not accomplished in 2014.
3. Major measures
1).To formulate the development planning (construction planning of English major,construction planning of business English major, construction planning of translationmajor, construction planning of Japanese major) of each major through researchand combining the history and reality of foreign language majors in thisuniversity. Each department shall put forward the first draft of their majorconstruction planning before December 30th in 2014 and specialistdemonstration will be in the beginning of 2015.
Responsible persons: HeShaobin, GuoHaixia,Lifang, WengFengxiang, YuZufa
2).The second English language department “majoring in translation” shall continueto strengthen the demonstration of major construction. Particularly under thenational standard of translation major to establish translation major and makethe cultivation of bachelors, masters (master of translation andinterpretation), and doctors majoring in translation interconnected in traininghierarchy. At the same time, let the establishment of translation major becomesthe stable cornerstone of the construction of master of translation andmaritime language also the applied doctorial discipline. Department of English(translation) shall provide the new version of <Report on the Constructionof Translation Major> before the end of December in 2014.
Responsible persons: Lifang, HeShaobin
3).From 2014 to 2015, the college encourage the research and study ontransregional, interdisciplinary and multi-industry talent demands by theresearch teams led by principals of each department or office, thus make theinnovation associated with the practice of our college.
Responsible persons: principals of eachdepartment or office.
3. Construction of teaching staff
1). Current situation
1.1 Cultivation projectsapproved by the university
1.1.1 Teaching team ofbusiness English, been rewarded excellent teaching team of Shanghai MaritimeUniversity in 2010, will endeavor in constructing Shanghai excellent teachingteam.
Responsible person: WengFengxiang
1.2. Cultivation projects approved by the college
1.2.1 Teaching team of audiovisual-oralteaching has achieved the college project for training (two years) in November2013.
Responsible person: WangYunsong
1.2.2 Teaching team of logistics Englishhas achieved the college project for training (two years) in November 2013.
Responsible person: Wangxian
2). Main problems
2.1 The objective and idea on whether thewhole layout of training the excellent teaching teams can support the futuredevelopment of academic subjects are unclear. The whole layout of training teamhas more randomness and is lack of scientificity.
2.2 Whether the teaching teams those arealready got the training project (including university-level and college-level)have set clear constructive objective is undetermined. Whether the measureshave been taken to realize the objectives is undetermined.
3). Major measures
3.1 The college makes demonstration onissues of teaching faculty training and team cultivation needed by thedevelopment of the secondary discipline for doctoral programs of maritimelanguage and application and the first-level discipline master degree offoreign languages and literatures. Then determine the priorities ofintroduction of talents, talents cultivation in accordance to the requirementof disciplinary development as the complement of <Development Planning onDiscipline and Major Construction (2013-2020)>. The demonstration shall be accomplishedand referred to related departments and leaders in October 2014.
Responsiblepersons: Zhangyan, YangJingang, Shangxin
3.2 The construction objectives ofthe above-mentioned teaching teams of business English, audiovisual-oral Englishand logistics English shall be explicit and practicable. Generally, the initialobjectives of the above-mentioned teaching teams are: apply for obtaining the titleof excellent teaching team; each team shall have at least one university-levelkey curriculum, video curriculum or excellent curriculum and achieve the relevantteaching results (mainly with development of teaching materials, newcurriculums and research papers).
Responsible persons: WengFengxiang, WangYunsong, Wangxian
3.3 Cultivation project planned bythe college
3.3.1 Establish teaching and researchteam of maritime English (college English) and apply for the construction ofproject library to the university. The contents of this project library includeconstruction of teaching team, teaching research, teaching materialconstruction, internet multimedia courseware development and examinationdatabase construction. The team shall make efforts to develop the college Englishcourse with maritime characteristic Moocs (Massive Open Online Course). Timeine:the second half of 2014
Responsible person: HeShaobin
3.3.2 The main tasks of translationteaching team include echelon construction of translation teaching, teachingresearch, development of teaching materials, and development of net resources,etc. Timeline: the second half of 2014
Responsible persons: Shangxin, SongZhiping, etc.
3.3.3 The main tasks of basic Japaneseteaching team include echelon construction of teaching, teaching research,development of teaching materials and development of net resources, etc.Timeline: the second half of 2014
Responsible persons: YuZufa, etc.
4. Teaching staff construction
1). Current situation
There are 119 full-times teachers that are just enough to accomplishteaching tasks. The number of professional teachers and the qualification,professional title and age structure of teachers are imbalanced. For instance,both the business English and Japanese only have one professor.
2). Main problems
2.1 Currently our college has heavy teaching workload and is stilllack of permanent staff. However, the high academic threshold has impact onintroduction of foreign language talents.
2.2 Disciplinary background of teachers is not very reasonable. Thecollege is lack of teachers with maritime knowledge especially professionalteachers with knowledge of corpus linguistics, computational linguistics andlanguage testing urgently needed by major construction.
2.3 The distribution of professional title of teachers needsimprovement. Among the college English teachers, the figure of those possesstitle of a senior professional post is too low that will not benefit the constructionof college English teaching teams.
3). Major measures
3.1 Considering the particularity of teacher training for Japaneseand English (shipping English) teachers, college will provide policy support onintroduction of talents in the area of simultaneous interpretation of Japaneseand shipping English through after the university’s approval.
Responsible persons: Shangxin, YangJingang, GuoHaixia, YuZufa
3.2 Step to improve the teaching teams’ professional titlestructure, academic structure and the education related structure. Encourageand support some of the excellent young teachers to attain the title of asenior professional post. Encourage and support some of the young teachers toimprove their academic levels. Continue to support teachers further their studyin domestic and overseas institutions through various efforts.
3.3 Focus on more on unique strengths of major construction and stepto emphasizing the characteristics of curriculum system and teachers’ acquirementand accumulate of shipping knowledge. Prepare to cooperate with AcademicAffairs Division to implement the project of “training course of shippingknowledge for foreign languages teachers” and provide opportunities for thosetrained and qualified teachers to practice on board. Timeline: before the endof December in 2014
Responsible persons: Shangxin, HeShaobin, YangJingang
5. Curriculum construction
1). Current situation
1.1 Municipal excellentcurriculums projects already been approved
Translation, has awarded thetitle of “municipal excellent curriculum in Shanghai” headed by professorWangDawei in 2008 to 2011. The curriculum, with solid foundation of majorconstruction and support of academic degree program of first level disciplineplays an important role in development of master degree program of secondarydiscipline and bachelor’s degree program, as well as the development of thecollege. Various curriculums projects in all different levels that have beenapproved in our college are as follow:
Attached list: the list of college’s curriculum construction in fiveyears
1.1.1 Municipal excellent curriculumsin Shanghai
2007 | translation | Discipline basic course | WangDawei |
1.1.2 excellent curriculums in theuniversity:
2008-2013: none
1.1.3 Key curriculums of City Board of Education
1 | 2008 | Comprehensive English | Professional basic course | LuoLinquan |
2 | 2009 | College English reading | Common course | ZhangYiming、DingWeiguo |
| 2010 | none | ||
3 | 2011 | Advanced Japanese | Professional course | ZhangSuyun |
4 | Visual Japanese | Professional basic course | ZhangSuyun | |
| 2012 | none |
|
|
5 | 2013 | English listening and audio-visual and oral teaching | Discipline basic course | WangYunsong |
1.1.4 key curriculums in the university
1 | 2008 | Distinctive course of college English: translation between English and Chinese | HuYongfang |
2 | Japanese audiovisual and oral course | Zhuangyan | |
3 | 2009 | English composition | YuanYongfang |
4 | College English course for listening, speaking and writting | Gengyan | |
5 | 2010 | Advanced English | WuJianguo |
6 | History and Anthology of English Literature | GuoHaixia | |
7 | 2011 | Survey of English-speaking countries | YangLifang |
8 | 2012 | College English | TongHelong、Gengyan |
9 | 2013 | English lexicology | ZhangZhiguo |
10 | Translation of maritime laws and regulations | Gujie |
1.1.5 Video course in the university
1 | the first semester from 2012 to 2013 | Zhangyan | English Reading Ⅲ |
2 | WangYunsong | English audiovisual and oralⅠ | |
3 | The second semester from 2012 to 2013 | ZhangSuyun | Advanced Japanese Ⅱ |
4 | The first semester from 2013 to 2014 | ZhangGuohui | Comprehensive English Ⅰ |
5 | YuZufa | Basic Japanese Grammar Ⅲ | |
6 | The second semester from 2013 to 2014 | Qiaoran | English listening comprehensionⅡ |
7 | The first semester from 2014 to 2015 | ZhuLiya | Comprehensive English Ⅲ |
8 | LiLianji | Basic Japanese Ⅰ | |
9 | 余祖发 | Basic Japanese Ⅲ |
2). Main problems
2.1 The small quantity of curriculums especially the municipal anduniversity-level excellent curriculums.
2.2 The preliminary development stage of curriculum construction andthe lack of follow-up development of curriculum construction.
2.3 The lack of distinctive curriculums. The foundation courses haveweak competitiveness to apply for distinctive curriculum except the course “translationof maritime laws and regulations” taught by Gujie (in 2013).
[Annotations: Of the assessment index in the university, “cultivationplatform” namely the provincial or above curriculums including excellentcurriculums, video open courses and resource sharing courses gets 30 points. “Teachingachievement prize”, namely provincial or above teaching achievement prize gets20 points for the college. “Quality of teaching materials” namely provincial orabove planned or excellent teaching materials gets 15 points for the college. Eachadditional item is worth 10 points. The college got nothing in these threeitems.]
3). Major measures
3.1 In the process of the construction of all curriculums, collegeshould encourage the leading role of professors in undertaking the constructionof bureau-level and above key curriculums and excellent curriculums. Policysupports should be gave to the professors involved.
3.2. The construction and application of the translation course asthe national-level excellent curriculum should be in the charge of professorShangxin. The application of national-level excellent curriculum shall be accomplishedaround from 2015 to 2016.
Responsible persons in curriculum construction: Shangxin, etc. “Thetranslation course has already got approval of cultivation project ofnational-level excellent curriculum by the university.”
3.3 The responsible teachers of key curriculum of ShanghaiEducational Committee “English listening and audiovisual and oral English” (WangYunsong),“basic Japanese” (YuZufa) and “comprehensive English” (Zhangyan) shall carryout the curriculum construction and preparation of materials with the target ofapplication of excellent curriculum in Shanghai. Particularly, inviteprofessors to involve in the curriculum construction. The college considers givingpolicy support to professors involved in curriculum construction. The abovecurriculums shall accomplish the application of excellent curriculums inShanghai during 2015 to 2016. Persons in charge are as follow:
Audiovisual and oral English: WangYunsong; basic Japanese: YuZufa;comprehensive English: Zhangyan
3.4 “Comprehensive English”, “the history and anthology of Britishand American literature” shall positively apply for key curriculums in Shanghaion the basis of the current construction of university-level key curriculum. Thefirst application shall be accomplished in 2015.
Comprehensive English: Gengyan, TongHelong.
The history and anthology of British and American literature:GuoHaixia
3.5 logistic English shall pursue the goal of key and excellentcurriculum in the university (The college has approved its training projectfrom 2013 to 2015). The first application shall be accomplished in 2015.
Responsible person; Wangxian
6. International cooperation inrunning schools
6.1 Current situations
International cooperative education programs are already implementedin undergraduate education:
1. “3+1 dual degree cooperationwith British University of Portsmouth” which means that three years domesticeducation and one year education in University of Portsmouth.
2. “2+2 dual degree cooperationwith Japanese Nagasaki University of Foreign Languages” which means two yearsdomestic education and two years education in Nagasaki University of ForeignLanguages.
3. “3+1 education project” and “3+2education project” cooperated with American’s Kent State University.
4. Study tour program with JapaneseKinki University.
6.2 Main problems
6.2.1 Lower level and little quantityof cooperation universities in undergraduate education. The cooperation qualitybetween cooperation universities is somewhat low with little compactness.
6.2.2 Issues concerning aboutcooperation education still need improve such as credit certification, coursesand credit that students shall accomplish in our university.
6.2.3 The sole internationalcooperation program is sending overseas students. The study aboard program thatattracts international students to our university hasn’t achieved anysubstantial progress.
6.3 Major measures
6.3.1 Attract overseas students tostudy in our university through the program of “short-term internationalstudents in China” with cooperation universities (Portsmouth University, KentState University, Nagasaki University and Kinki University). Endeavour toaccomplish the first batch of short-term international students study in ouruniversity at the summer vacation time in 2015.
Responsible persons: Shangxin, ZhangGuohui
6.3.2. Formulate reasonable incentive system to arouse teachers’ enthusiasm.Particularly contact the teachers studying abroad to help our collegeaccomplish the international cooperation program with Australian and Canadianuniversities.
Responsible persons: Shangxin, ZhangGuohui
7. construction of teachinglaboratory
7.1 Current situations
7.1.1 Delegate the management of teachinglaboratory to the colleges. (It has been approved by the university in April2014.)
7.1.2 Progress on application of the teachinglaboratories in establishment has been made. (Presently one teaching laboratoryis in formal establishment.)
7.1.3 A translation lab has been establishedin 2013 together with the original six speech labs. “Simultaneousinterpretation lab” now is under construction after the approval ofconstruction in form of project library in March 2014.
7.2 mainproblems
7.2.1 Construction on universities’ teachinglaboratories is the basic construction closely related to disciplineconstruction, major construction and curriculum construction. It measures theuniversity’s schooling level and marks discipline quality of the university andalso the necessary way to improve cultivation quality of students. At present,the whole college attaches little attention to teaching laboratory constructionwith low participation of teachers.
7.2.2 Quantity and scale of labs are small. Lackof investment and managers of labs can’t meet the demand of practical teaching.
7.2.3 The level of openness and exchanges ofthe existing labs are not enough. The latest information on disciplinaryconstruction and academic knowledge can’t be used in practical teaching intime.
7.3 major measures
7.3.1 Emphasize the status of experimentalteaching in the process teaching process. In the revision teaching plan andteaching programme, college will gradually increase independent course practiceon the basis of the existing lab conditions to reflect the two different butequal teaching methods theory teaching and experiment teaching in the wholeteaching process and transform experiment and practice teaching’s affiliatestatus.
Responsibleperson: HeShaobin
7.3.2 In thesecond half of 2014, the college applies key discipline laboratory projects “informationprocessing and translation research center of maritime language” and “computeraided translation lab for MTI” in the form of project library application. Atthe beginning of or the second half of 2014, the college shall apply projectlibrary of “teaching research center of maritime English (college English)”.
Responsiblepersons: Shangxin, HeShaobin
7.3.3 Make experimentteaching plan in the undergraduate teaching plans and improve the fulfillmentrate of experiment course to promote students’ language practice.
Responsiblepersons: HeShaobin, etc.
7.3.4 Createconditions to improve usage efficiency of labs and arrange times to open thelabs to all teachers and students. Timeline: the arrangement of opening translationlab and its implementation shall be accomplished in the second half of 2014.
Foreign LanguagesCollege in Shanghai Maritime University
2014.9.15