Bridging the Gap between English Classes for International Students

This study documents a needs analysis undertaken at Colorado State University. Thestudy focuses on a group of twenty-nine international students participating in INTO, anacademic foundations program at the university. The study seeks to determine the currentEnglish abilities of the students, as well as the knowledge and skills that they are currentlyacquiring from EAP-151, an INTO English course. The study then seeks to determine whatknowledge and skills the students will eventually need in order to succeed in CO-150, theuniversity’s required English composition course. The purpose of the study is to discover waysin which EAP-151 might be revised or supplemented in order to better prepare the INTOstudents for CO-150. In order to accomplish this task, the researchers conducted a presentsituation analysis, a target situation analysis, and a discourse analysis. A number of datacollection methods were used, including questionnaires, document analysis, and classroomobservation. The results of the study suggest that the INTO students would benefit fromincreased attention to essay planning and organization, critical reading, and academic vocabularybuilding.