(1178) ACADEMIC CAREER GUIDANCE FOR INTENDING LINGUISTS: CHALLENGES AND PROSPECTS

摘要

This paper examines the issue of monitoring career choices of university students majoring in Linguistics in the framework of intensive academic career guidance. The latter is viewed as an indispensable innovative component of modernization of the system of higher education in Russia. The research shows comparatively low academic mobility of Russian university students and presents the ‘final’ career choices made by school leavers. Thus, the issue of academic career guidance in Linguistics is crucial for both educators and students since it will allow to eliminate ‘casual’ people in the profession and determine their further personal and professional development. The research is based on the case study of a career guidance model that has been successfully introduced at the Higher school of foreign languages and translation studies, Kazan Federal University, Russia. In the context the authors reveal the milestones of the academic career guidance model to provide for early professional adaptation of Linguistic degree undergraduates. The guidance is realized through a collaborative partnership model where university, school and students are actively involved to provide for careful and successful career choices and subsequent personal fulfillment. The proposed academic career guidance model includes research and development, motivation, skills building, adaptation, communication, technology and assessment components - all centred around career guidance of intending linguists. The authors integrate approaches and technologies, ensuring the effective functioning of the proposed model in practice. A special feature of this model is that it has been developed on a broad experimental basis, the theoretical model has been tested in the authors’ long-term practice and has not been previously applied by other researchers. The article provides recommendations on the implementation of the progressive technology that allows academic staff to gradually involve potential applicants in research and professional activities. The authors determine the factors that contribute to effective operation of the career guidance model at a university. They specify the priority areas of integrative activity of the staff on academic career guidance including such components as motivation, education and skill-building. The authors highlight the challenges of academic career guidance in Linguistics, the factors that hinder the process and those that increase its efficiency, identify the areas of educational and research work with students and specify the role of various university staff in the process. The leading approaches of the research are observation and classification of the material as well as interviewing, collecting, analyzing and synthesizing the data, received via interviews and survey. The paper stresses an active role of the university staff as facilitators in the process of academic career guidance to help school children and university applicants make a careful career choice, prepare them for a new academic environment and motivate their personal growth and development to become a highly demanded specialist with a university degree.