English Language-Mediated Settings and Educational Inequalities

In this book, Goundar explores how educational inequalities are responsible for the way students perform in English language-mediated school settings. He seeks to establish an explicit connection between language testing and educational inequalities at the higher education level.

With its focus on higher education, this research is a fresh reminder of the need to continuously revisit and unsettle inequalities that are embedded in education systems. In the South Pacific context, this study reveals the current issues, including medium of instruction challenges, lack of teaching and learning resources, teacher shortages, and language barriers. Goundar?s research seeks new answers to the problem of academic English language skills faced by undergraduate students. Since English is a second language for the majority of students in Fiji and as the quality of education varies between urban and rural schools, this cumulatively impacts students? acquisition of English skills, and, consequently, their university performance. The important questions posed and addressed in this book are as follows:

• What are the language implications of colonisation on education in the South Pacific? What resources and learning opportunities are provided in schools to promote equal access to education content for students from non-English-speaking backgrounds?


• How do students from different schooling backgrounds in Fiji cope with an English language-mediated university learning environment?


• Do educational inequalities manifest in the performance of students from all schooling backgrounds, or are they confined to specific sociocultural zones?

Drawing on a unique dataset from a context in the Global South, this book provides new insights for a more holistic approach to examining academic language proficiency and the use of language testing.

English Language-mediated Settings and Educational Inequalities: Language Education Policy Agendas in the South Pacific is suitable for postgraduate students in language policy and planning, multilingual language policies for schools, medium of instruction studies, and language testing, and South Pacific studies.

"A searing and path-breaking treatise that troubles the coloniality of language and literacy education in the South Pacific. This book is a must-read for educators interested in what epistemic and cognitive justice for multilingual students might look like in theory and in practice."

Finex Ndhlovu, University of New England, Australia

?The significance, originality, and contributions of this book is that it is the most recent study that has sought to establish an explicit connection between language testing and educational inequalities at the higher education level. It is innovative and weighty as it has asked different sets of questions in seeking new answers to the problem of academic English language skills faced by undergraduate students in Fiji.?

Ravnil Narayan, Tsinghua University Beijing, China

?English Language Mediated Settings and Educational Inequalities: Language Education Policy Agendas in the South Pacific bridges the gap between students? performance in language tests and their unequal access to English language learning throughout their education. Through narratives, it brings students? perspectives about constrains and injustices in higher education and provides ideas on how these can be addressed.?

Dr Norbella Miranda, Associate Professor of Languages, Universidad del Valle

?Prashneel Goundar provides an excellent contribution on the issues faced by undergraduate students in their academic writing. Lack of good writing skills for many of them, pose significant challenges in their studies. This book based on research in Fiji provides a useful framework for policy interventions by higher educational institutions in Fiji to improve not only writing skills of undergraduate students but also ways in which they could be supported to successfully complete their qualifications. In addition, the analysis in the book could help address issues such as access to resources and strategies to improve the writing skills for undergraduate students.?

Professor Biman C. Prasad, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance ? Fiji