ABSTRACT
Description of the English programme The English Language Institute (ELI) of the American University in Washington, DC, is a medium-sized intensive English programme of about 500 students, whose purpose is primarily to feed international students into the mainstream of the university. Students can begin academic classes before fully finishing their English requirement, so there is a mixture of non-degree and degree (matriculated) undergraduate students, as well as graduate students and a few English-only students. The skills-based curriculum permits students to study in different levels of reading, writing, listening/speaking and grammar. Students are evaluated separately in the four skills when they arrive and are placed into any of six levels of courses. The first four levels are intensive, with 75-minute classes of all four skills meeting four days per week and the two fifth-level classes also meet four days a week. The credit-bearing sixth-level class, meeting twice a week, is a freshman composition course reserved for international students and is required for graduation. The very minimal entry requirements for ELI - a secondary school diploma of some kind and some previous English study - permit students whose educational backgrounds may he very weak to attempt to gain admission to the university hy taking academic courses once they have reached high intermediate English levels . If they can prove they can do university work, they can he admitted.
