The growth of an emerging field: A history of ESL program development at the University of Minnesota

Abstract

This paper examines the history of ESL program development at the university level beginning with a broad view and then focusing on specific programs at the University of Minnesota - Twin Cities campus. In this project oral histories were gathered from ESL professionals at the University of Minnesota through 14 semi-structured interviews which focused on the topic of ESL programming and its development at the University of Minnesota. The information from these interviews was used to outline a general history of each program, including the Minnesota English Center, the Master’s Program in ESL, the International Teaching Assistant Program, nonnative speaker sections of Freshman Composition, the Commanding English Program, various special language programs, and the Minnesota English Language Program. Two themes were also chosen based on their appearance in the literature and a preliminary interview conducted by the researcher. Challenges confronting each program as well as the two themes, adaptation and collaboration, are discussed, and conclusions are related to the greater population of ESL programs in the country.