Investigation on the contributions of erasmus exchange program to Turkish prospective EFL teachers and the problems encountered during the process

In today's globalized world, the dynamics of education is changing each day. As Bloom (2008) states, the education plays a vital role in the successful globalization progress. International student mobility and study abroad programs can have a great impact on the development of prospective EFL teachers. Especially with the prevalence of the Erasmus exchange program, which was launched in 1987 in Europe and in which Turkey participated in 2004, it became easier for Turkish students to have study abroad experience. The primary goal of this study was to investigate the perceptions of Turkish prospective EFL teachers regarding the contributions of Erasmus exchange program to their academic, language, social, cultural, personal, and career development as well as the problems that they encountered before, during and after the Erasmus mobility. The study was carried out with the participation of 37 Turkish prospective EFL teachers who were selected through criterion sampling method. The mixed methods design was adopted in the study. Data were collected by means of an online survey developed by Önen (2017) and semistructured interview. The second part of the survey, which consisted of Likert-scale, multiple choice, and rank-order scale questions, was analysed quantitatively in terms of frequencies and percentages. For the content analysis of the semi-structured interviews, a qualitative analysis software called MAXQDA 2020 was used. Results revealed that the participants believed they benefited from the Erasmus program mostly in terms of personal and cultural development. Their language development was mainly related to speaking skills and fluency. It was also found that participants encountered many problems in the Erasmus process. They believed that "pre-Erasmus" was the most problematic process. While the lack of information and paper work were the main problems encountered before the Erasmus, "during the Erasmus process" mainly academic and financial problems were encountered. Some participants experienced "the post-Erasmus syndrome" after the Erasmus mobility. In the light of these findings, suggestions for institutions, future exchange students and further research were presented. Keywords: Erasmus exchange program, international student mobility, prospective EFL teachers, contributions, problems.

Keyword: Aday öğretmenler = Candidate teachers ; Erasmus = Erasmus ; Erasmus öğrenci değişim programı = Erasmus student exchange programme ; Uluslararası öğrenciler = International student ; Yabancı dil eğitimi = Foreign language education ; Yabancı dil öğrenimi = Foreign language learning ; Yabancı dil öğretimi = Foreign language teaching ; Yurt dışı eğitimi = Abroad education ; İngilizce = English