[00:00:00] Hello everyone. We are reporting on day two of the BALEAP Conference at the University of Plymouth. The day began with a keynote by Jenna Mittelmeier on the implications of and the possible solutions to deficit framings of international students.
[
00:00:19] I see a lot of our work and our research related to international students as, as based in good intentions, but ultimately very flaunt.

[00:00:29] There's a tendency to describe international students in terms of what they are assumed to lack. They aren't good writers that their language is poor, that they aren't critical thinkers.

[00:00:40] They don't participate well in class. The list goes on and on.

[00:00:43] Writing isn't deficient, it's simply different. It's a different way of approaching rhetoric and writing based on their cultural and educational histories, which vary from the context in which we might be teaching.

[00:00:56] Might we instead recognize the inherent unkindness in positioning their cultural ways of knowing and doing as inferior something not good enough that must be changed. Is it perhaps more kind to try to transform these structures to be more interculturally inclusive of alternative mechanisms for things like writing?

[00:01:21] A better narrative is one that recognizes the knowledge and linguistic heritage that international students bring with them into higher education and questions the system and structures which deny their equal contribution or reduce their ability to be treated or to feel as more fully human.

[00:01:41] So Anna, day two. What are your thoughts and reflections about the keynote from Jenna? I love the concept of kindness and rethinking this idea of what is criticality and how we market. That really, um, hit me, really struck a, struck a note with me, 

[00:02:01] Okay, so I'm talking to Seraphim , would you like to give some thoughts on the keynote today? 
[00:02:09] Absolutely. , I thought it was fascinating. , I think she raised some , really important and interesting questions about how we approach, , developing our practice with the best interests of our students in mind, , while attempting to deconstruct some of the more problematic elements around the field in general.

[00:02:29] I thought the things that she raised at the end about kind of flipping the problems that we identify. So instead of focusing so much on what we think maybe our students can't do, how can we, , almost reverse engineer it to try to understand how we can maybe restructure our approaches to meet their needs instead of blaming them.

[00:02:52] The rest of the day was jam packed with parallel sessions, a BALEAP SIG World Cafe, and the BALEAP AGM. 
[00:03:01] I'm with Helen, the BALEAP SIG officer. Today was the SIG World Cafe. Do you want to say a bit about what happened today? Yeah, we had good representation from the, 12 SIGs and there was a real buzz, a real atmosphere in the room.

[00:03:17] The SIGs are really important to people. , from a much wider community, aren't they? Absolutely. , there's a lot of work that goes online. A lot of the, , events, meetings that they hold are accessible online , and they've had some really good attendance at those events and the feedback from them has also been excellent. So don't feel that geographically you are limited to be able to take part. On the BALEAP website, there's information about joining them so it doesn't matter where you are in the world, if any of the SIGs are of interest to you, then get in touch with them, , and join and one of their events.  

[00:03:52] I am here with Costas. You are a mathematician and it's your first BALEAP conference. Do you want to tell us about your experience so far? 

[00:04:01] So as a mathematician at the University of Leeds, attending BALEAP for the first time has certainly been. A unique experience. It has been great meeting new people and learning about the current developments in EAP and how we can collaborate to better support our students. So why am I here? Because I've been collaborating with the AP lecturers on several projects. So one of these projects is how we're writing an open access web book on the academic language of mathematics.

[00:04:27] It's a collaboration with and EAP lecturing leads and Chen. A mathematician at Southwest Ong University in China. The aim of this book is to help any student that encounters mathematics in the degree, whether they are doing mathematics, physics, engineering, chemistry, and so on.

[00:04:43] Since this is an open access book, we would like to share this with everyone in due course. Okay. Thank you for that. So, , the theme of the conference is collaboration and what's been important in the collaboration with the EAP lecturers that you've been working with?

[00:04:58] Uh, collaboration is necessary in our field because as a mathematician. I don't know what is the best way to teach students the language part of the mathematics.

[00:05:06] And on the other hand, EAP lecturers don't know the mathematical knowledge required to teach the language. So yes, collaboration is necessary. 

[00:05:13] There were also some difficult conversations about challenges in the sector, particularly in the UK around precarity and job security.  

[00:05:28] There are deep concerns facing our sector in very uncertain times. Concerns which require collective reflection and consideration because they are so structural and so unfixable alone.

[00:05:41] It is been a really interesting day. I think there's been a lot of conversations about the challenges facing are, you know, EAP practitioners, specifically in the UK at the moment around job parity, job insecurity. There's a lot of challenges to, , institutions, student numbers, and how jobs are being moved around because of that. And I suppose also for me, it was kind of interesting to meet a lot of people who are here because I've been funded by their institutions, and I think that's really positive. , I'm here because I've been funded by BALEAP because I work on one of the SIGs. So, , , it's been really beneficial for me because I came to the conference with a really negative space because of things that are happening in my institution and to do with my own jobs insecurity and there's been no funding at all. It's not nice that other people are in the same situation, but it's interesting to see that others are and for how we all support each other. So yeah, there's been a lot of, , a lot of acknowledgement of the difficulties that are going on and I think sometimes it's just good to talk about that. In such a dark situation is a lot positive from having communities and if you are working in EAP and you feel alone, join the community, join a SIG, do something, find people that are in the same situation so it's not as isolating or challenging. That's definitely a positive.  

[00:07:06] Susie, you shared some very exciting news today about a brand new BALEAP Journal. Do you want to tell us about it? 

[00:07:15] Sure. The BALEAP Journal of Research and Practice was launched at the AGM. It's an opportunity for us to publish the proceedings from the conferences. We've had many instances with the PIMS where people have wanted to publish. The journal is open access. People can submit any time. It's peer reviewed, that peer review process will be open, so it's dialogic. So it is gonna be a place where we can publish all of the great work that we do bringing theory into practice within the BALEAP community. It's housed within the Warwick University press and it seemed in keeping with the Warwick Conference in 2023, where we wanted to shake things up a little bit the ethos of the journal is that really there are no genre rules. , and you know, so much that's in line with what's happening in EAP and pushing the idea of decolonizing academic writing, embracing epistemic heritage and identity of authors. I hope that the, this really is a journal where that can happen.    

[00:08:17] Towards the end of the conference, we congratulated the new BALEAP fellows.

[00:08:23] I'm here with Aniki and Marusa. You both received your, , BALEAP Fellowship certificates today, so congratulations. Thank you. Thank you very much. I received the associate fellow accreditation. My experience has been really positive. It's something that's really helped me develop as a professional, as a practitioner. I really appreciate BALEAPk for giving us the chance to implement and show all our work.

[00:08:52] I'm really happy to have received the, the fellowship. My next step now is, you know, senior fellowship, I'd like to say a big thank you to for giving me the opportunity as well as to my mentor. She's been great. She's been very supportive, always, you know, been there for to provide any kind of help if needed. I can only say it's a great experience, highly recommended.  

[00:09:17] Thanks again for listening to this conference snapshot. We hope you're enjoying our coverage of the conference. If you have any ideas or suggestions or you would like to get involved, please , contact us.