Communication needs of Thai civil engineering students

This article reports on an examination of the communication needs of a group of Thai civil engineering students. Twenty-five stakeholders helped identify the communication needs of the students by participating in individual interviews. These included employers, civil engineers, civil engineering lecturers, ex-civil engineering students of the technical English course, and ESP teachers. Based on the stakeholders’ recommendations, the teacher/researcher determined that four communicative events should be incorporated into the course, namely, talking about daily tasks and duties, reading textbooks, reading manuals, and writing periodic/progress reports. The findings highlight the increasing demand for professional English in the engineering field and the degree to which English is required in various circumstances throughout Thailand. It is crucial to add more professional English courses to engineering programmes and to conduct further research to predict learners’ needs as specifically as possible. Those needs can then be more efficiently satisfied in the ESP courses.