Students’ Perceptions Regarding their B.A. in English Language Graduate Profile

Abstract

This paper examines the perception undergraduate students have, prior to graduation, regarding the attributes they have developed in terms of transferable and communicative skills. The goal was to shed light on how undergraduate students in the context of this research perceive their graduate profile. This study was carried out at a university school of languages in southeast Mexico over the course of a year, from August 2016 to July 2017. Thirty male and female students participated in the study. Their ages ranged from 21 to 30 years old. They all were about to complete the last term of the BA program at the time the data were collected. The data collection tools used for this inquiry were interviews and surveys. The former were used to get an insight, in general terms, into the participants’ perceptions whereas the latter provided richer information about the students’ perceived competences and skills. The data suggest that students perceived gains in critical thinking skills, research skills, language skills, autonomy, and motivation as part of the attributes they developed within the program. However, attributes regarding teaching skills, learning strategies, technology skills, teamwork and ability to develop new projects and ideas are perceived as poorly developed or not acquired at all.