Within the scope of the Erasmus+ SMARTI project, the EMI (English Medium Instruction) centre of the Public Administration Academy of the Republic of Armenia (PAARA), and the modules it has developed and piloted, undergo external review. For that purpose, on March 4, the expert panel held online meeting discussions with the PAARA’s rector, coordinators, teaching staff and trained participants of SMARTI project and EMI centre. 

Experts and a student expert from the SMARTI project’s partner HEIs are involved in the EMI centre’s external review process. The members of the expert panel are Vanane Mirzoyan, Candidate of Psychological Sciences, Professor, teacher at the Vanadzor State University, head of the Vanadzor branch of the “AYG” Center for Psychological Services, Artak Hovhannisyan, Candidate of Historical Sciences, Associate Professor, teacher at M. Nalbandyan State University of Shirak, Arpine Hakobyan, a master’s student of the AP “English Language and Literature” of Vanadzor State University, Lily Bethencourt, International Project Manager at Riga Technical University.

The coordinators of the expert panel are Varduhi Gyulazyan, head of ANQA’s Institutional and Programme Accreditation Division and Meri Barsegghyan, specialist of ANQA’s Policy Development and Implementation Division.      
Previously, the EMI centre conducted a self-evaluation and SWOT analysis of its activities, piloted two English-language modules based on a relevant template and submitted them to the expert panel.

During the external review process, the expert panel paid attention to the following issues:

• EMI centre’s role in fulfilling the PAARA’s mission and strategic plan;
• EMI centre’s contribution to the PAARA’s internationalization strategy, with a particular focus on the opportunities for English-language professional education to enhance the attractiveness for international students;
•  scope and mechanisms of cooperation between the EMI centre and the PAARA’s other subdivisions;
•  possibilities of the ongoing operation of the EMI Centre and the expansion of a range of English-language modules after the end of the SMARTI project,  ways of ensuring their sustainability;
• mechanisms for achieving the defined outcomes and ensuring the quality of the taught modules.

Next on, the expert panel will prepare a report, pointing out the strengths and weaknesses of the EMI centre and the two taught modules. The report will contain recommendations on the areas in need for enhancement, highlighting the correlation between the EMI centere’s activities and the PAARA’s strategic management, and ensuring the sustainability of the centre’s activities.  

SMARTI (Support for Innovative Methodology, Approaches and Tools for Teaching through the Medium of English in order to improve Educational Yield, Sustainability and Internationalization) is a three-year multi-country project, seeking to promote a change in the system of pedagogic training of university teachers through teaching in English by modernization of curriculum for national and international spectrums.

Within the scope of the project, EMI centres were established in five Armenian HEIs and modules were piloted. Now the EMI centres and the two piloted modules undergo external review. The process coordinator is ANQA.