After 10 years of support, Garnet Education are no longer be in a position to sponsor the IATEFL SIG Journal after issue 47. Garnet Education has provided unmatched professional support of the highest quality which stretches from issue 30 (Summer-Autumn 2007) until now (issue 47). They have also sponsored the publication of four ESP SIG books, and for this we are indebted too. With Garnet’s sponsorship we have been able to develop a solid set of EAP and ESP publications which we will now have to maintain in our own right.

It is now necessary to make plans for the future of the journal. The opinion of the ESP SIG committee and the journal editors is that they should take this opportunity to switch to an electronic version of the journal in the immediate future in order to keep up with the times. The committee wanted to know what members thought of this proposal. A short questionnaire was sent out. The committee hoped that IATEFL would publish the findings, but, as they didn’t, here they are:

1. Are you a member of IATEFL ESP SIG? (69 responses)

Yes, individual member.	65
Yes, institutional member.	2
No, not a member.	2

2. Do you read the IATEFL ESP SIG Journal? (69 responses)

Yes, always.	42
Sometimes.	21
No, never.	6

3. If you read the IATEFL ESP SIG Journal, (65 responses)

it is my own copy.	60
it is a friend/colleague’s copy	3
it’s an institutional copy.	2

4. If you do not read the ESP SIG Journal, why not? (14 responses)

I never see it.	5
A colleague steals it before I get the chance to read it.	0
It’s boring.	0
Other	9

Other includes: workload, lack of time, didn’t know it existed, not relevant, never see it.

5. What do you think of the Journal overall? (64 responses)

	Index	Count
Fantastic	1	8
	2	38
	3	15
	4	3
Terrible	5	0

6. Would you prefer to keep the paper journal or should it go electronic? (70 responses)

Keep the paper version.	9
Change to a digital version	38
Both	16
Other	7

7. Which sections do you read?

	I always read them.	I sometimes read them.	I never read them.
Articles	40	19	2
Reports	17	38	3
Reviews	22	35	3

8. What is your opinion of the various sections?

	I like them very much.	They’re OK	I don’t like them.
Articles	41	20	1
Reports	21	36	0
Reviews	28	32	1

9. What do you think of the content?

	Enough.	Right amount.	Not enough.	Too much.
Academic English (EAP) content	17	27	6	6
Professional English (EPP) content	11	30	15	1
English for Work (EOP) content	12	23	18	2

10. Who do you teach – tick all that apply? (66 responses)

	Index	Count
Academics	10	17
Teachers	9	23
Professionals	8	24
Manual Workers	7	7
Graduate Students	6	30
Undergraduates	5	50
High School	4	7
Children	3	3
Unemployed	2	1
Others	1	6

11.What level are your students? (64 responses)

	Index	Count
Advanced	4	51
Intermediate	3	51
Elementary	2	19
Beginners	1	9

12. Is there anything else you would like to see in the journal? (16 responses)

• Conference announcements for timely, active participation and research funding options for international scholars
• More about teaching young professionals
• A letters section would be good.
• Academic articles on genre writing and global Englishes-scientific research
• Practical activities rather than just formal articles etc.
• It would be nice to see the articles indexed online for ease of retrieval
• Perhaps some more summaries of relevant research articles.
• Less theory. More classroom based practitioner research
• Less from Anglo-Saxon based perspective – more on global Englishes – I guess Garnet Publ. was Anglo-Saxon from the sound of it. How about finding an Asian sponsor?
• I guess I am happy with the way it is. Thank you all! I marked both (paper and electronic options, though I do realise there’s just one feasible – electronic, right? 🙂
• More variety in terms of contributors and reviewers
• Different authors. Fresh takes on EAP that don’t converge with the status quo would be welcome. I turn off when I see the see the same name / same themes again and again. Something different, something challenging! Go digital. My experience from working on an an IATEFL publication was that we had to go digital or go bust.
• Open section, where members in year 2 can report / comment on benefits / weaknesses of reports provided in reports / articles in previous year (year 1)
• Teaching tips or classroom materials used for EAP. I also teach engineers, architects, social workers, visual communication students and conservation & restoration students, for example, so it would be nice to see something for those in the English for work section i.e. books, teaching ideas.
• EAP for year 11 and 12 secondary school students
• Perhaps an ESP teaching question/answer section….around practical teaching issues.

AJG Comments: I think you will see that most people are happy with the present structure of the journal, with its article, book reviews and conference reports.  There were some interesting comments and the committee will try to take note of them in future issues. However, the topics covered are determined largely by the contributions the journal receives.

I would particularly like to respond to the person who said: “Less from Anglo-Saxon based perspective – more on global Englishes – I guess Garnet Publ. was Anglo-Saxon from the sound of it. How about finding an Asian sponsor?”

A quick survey of the SIG committee and the last few journals shows:

Current ESP SIG Committee 1 English 2 Turkish 1 Polish 1 Greek Previous: Nepali

Current editors Editor in Chief: Polish Editor 1: English Editor 2: South African Previous: Nepali

Issue 47 Editor: England Contributors: 1 UK 1 Japan 1 China 1 India 1 Indonesia 1 Brunei

Issue 46 Editor: South Africa Contributors: 3 Austria 1 Russia 1 Nigeria 1 Cuba

Issue 45 Editor: South Africa Contributors: 1 England 1 USA 3 Japan 2 Japan 2 USA

Issue 44 Editor: South Africa Contributors: 1 England 1 Greece 4 Argentina 1 Italy 1 Russia

It is also worth pointing out that that Garnet Education is Lebanese owned.

I do not think this counts as being predominantly Anglo-Saxon.