CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION
1.1 Research Background
With China’s entry into WT O and rapid tr ade expansion, Business English (BE) has become an indispensable factor in interna tional trade over the world, with over ninety percent of international trade in China done in BE (Zha ng Qi, 2011). To meet such great social need for BE talents, universities and colleges started their own BE programs in the absence of a unified guideline.
Since the Ministry of Education’s approval of setting up the under graduate BE program in the University of International Business and Economics in 2007, 216 colleges and universities have been authorized to carry out the programs by far, and an increasing number of colleges and universities are preparing to apply for the authorization. Besides University of International Business and Economics, Guangdong University of Foreign Studies (GDUFS) and Shanghai University of International Business and Econom ics (SUIBE, previous called Shanghai University of Finance and Ec onomics) are the top three leading universities in BE program. In 2009, the Higher Education Press and UIBE co-published the T eaching Requirement for Undergraduate BE Program in Higher Education (trial)1, which provided a theore tical guidance for th e undergraduate BE education. At the end of 2012, the Ministry of Education published the Catalogue of Undergraduate Programs (2012) and listed the undergraduate BE program in parallel with the English program and Translation program, which symbolizes the rapid evolvement of undergraduate BE program as well as its deve lopment from self-management status to a more unified and principled one.
Although the undergraduate BE program in China has entered a new era and will surely have a prom ising future, the resea rch of BE is at prelim inary stage and the theoretical system is sti ll under construction. A number of scholars a nd experts are endeavoring to advance the BE program as well as its teaching reform, exploring and standardizing the education model for fostering qualified BE graduates. As it is stated in the Teaching Requirement, the cultivating obj ectives is to “cultivate com pound English language professionals who have solid language basic skills and a broad international prospective, who can put inte rnational perspective, who can put international business knowledge and skills reasonably , who can ma ster the basic knowledge and theory of economics, management, law and related disciplines, who possess higher hum anistic knowledge and cross-cultural com munication skills, and who can undertake business, trade, management, finance and foreign affairs” (Chen Zhunming, Wang Lifei, 2009).
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1.2 Research Purpose
The purpose of the present paper is to identif y the target needs, learning needs and needs of national development of BE program, to check whether the coursebook can meet these needs, and to com e up with several su ggestions for the im provement of BE comprehensive coursebooks. Based on the theories of needs analysis, this research first identifies the target needs, learning needs and needs of nationa l development of BE program by analyzing questionnaires distributed to BE unde rgraduates and graduates in SEIB. Meanwhile, a system atic coursebook ev aluation is carried out, after which the author analyzes the ev aluations results, summarizes the merits and weaknesses of the coursebook. Finally, several suggestions fo r BE com prehensive coursebook will be proposed.
The goal of under graduate BE program is to cultivate BE graduates that can m eet
