The Academic English Programme (AEP) Screenshot of the AEP homepagehelps students whose first language is not English to reach their full potential on their Reading degree programmes. Each department at Reading has a dedicated Academic Language and Literacy Liaison contact from the AEP. We can offer advice and support on matters related to international/EU students and any student whose first language is not English. If you have any questions about the AEP, please contact your Liaison using the contact details on the web pages.

The provision has a number of strands:

  • You can refer your international and EU students to our online courses for self-enrolment, which offer academic skills and literacy development with an integral English-language dimension. We currently offer the following courses: Academic Grammar; Core Academic Writing Skills; Dissertation & Thesis Writing; Essays: Criticality, Argumentation and Structure; Presentation Skills These courses are designed for independent learning and contain a mix of short video input and guided independent tasks, which students can work through at their own pace. Lecturers are also available to answer questions via weekly live slots.
  • You can also refer students to Academic Language Webinars designed to help students with the language needed in a range of academic communication contexts. Topics include: Language for Writing reflectively;  Writing critically- focus on language; Noun phrases: the building blocks of academic texts; Improve your academic vocabulary (1): Growing your Academic vocabulary size; Language for Academic Integrity: paraphrasing and summarising; Dissertations: Language for the Literature Review
  • For individualised support, you can refer your students to 1-to-1 Consultations for Writing and Presentations: All international/EU students can book three 30-minute consultations per semester and can, for example, receive feedback on aspects of their academic writing such as structure, language and style, rehearse and get feedback on oral presentations, or receive advice on pronunciation or strategies to develop speaking and listening fluency.
  • Embedded academic language & literacy courses: In collaboration with Schools and Departments, discipline-specific AEP courses are offered currently for 26 degree-programme cohorts. If you feel your programme would benefit from this kind of AEP provision, please contact your Academic Language and Literacy Liaison.
  • In collaboration with the Graduate School, we provide writing courses for doctoral students whose first language is not English: Core Language and Skills for Research Writing; Doctoral Thesis Writing: Structure & Language (Science & Technology); Doctoral Thesis Writing: Structure & Language (Social Science & Humanities); Writing and Editing your Thesis with Corpora. For more information about these courses and how to refer your doctoral students to them, see the Graduate School’s Training and Development web pages.