Short-term study abroad (SA) programmes are often promoted as an effective way of developing English language skills and accessing opportunities for intercultural learning. Whilst pre-departure intercultural training is thought to play an important role in enhancing the potential for meaningful learning, overemphasis on essentialist framings of…

Higher education plays a fundamental role in the construction of a European citizenship that demands the development of plurilingual competences. Although the Bologna Process highlights that development (relating it to mobility, employability and lifelong learning), language education does not seem to be a priority in the agenda of higher…

A project introducing English as a third language in 30 elementary schools in the Basque Country (Spain) is described. The program, emerging from a national curriculum reform effort, begins English instruction when students are eight years old, three years earlier than previously. Students are already bilingual in Spanish and Basque, both official…

The subject of bilingualism is especially important in Bruni, a country with a multilingual population and a bilingual education policy, and it was felt that an international conference which examined bilingualism and bilingual education in a variety of 'development' contexts would be useful in reviewing and fine tuning of Bruneis' already…