English for Professionals students' perceptions of the relevance of internship to their undergraduate courses and career choices
Higher Education, Skills and Work-Based Learning
ISSN: 2042-3896
Article publication date: 16 February 2021
Issue publication date: 19 October 2021
Abstract
Purpose
This qualitative study examined English for Professionals students' experience of the internship programme and their perceptions of the relevance of the internship programme to their current and future courses and to their future career choices.
Design/methodology/approach
This study employed a qualitative inquiry in which qualitative data were collected using journal writing. Using purposeful sampling, 40 English for Professionals students in Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) were selected. Data were analysed using thematic analysis.
Findings
This study revealed that the internship programme was beneficial to interns because it helped them to gain real-world experience and knowledge about the environment of real workplace. Interns' negative experience can affect their career selection. The majority of the participants revealed that the internship programme is relevant to most of their undergraduate courses. The participants revealed that the internship programme was effective as it helped them to explore their career choices and to select future courses that match their interests.
Originality/value
Taking into account students' negative experience and their perceptions of the relevance of internship to their courses and career choices, improvement of undergraduate programmes can be done. Unlike samples in previous studies, the sample in this study is English for Professionals students. The study provides significant findings which are related to interns' perceptions of the relevance of the internship programme to their career choices. Unlike all data collection methods used in previous studies, journal writing was used to collect qualitative data in this study.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Citation
Husain, F.M. and Mahfoodh, O.H.A. (2021), "English for Professionals students' perceptions of the relevance of internship to their undergraduate courses and career choices", Higher Education, Skills and Work-Based Learning, Vol. 11 No. 5, pp. 1068-1088. https://doi.org/10.1108/HESWBL-02-2020-0020
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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