Abstract
The requirement that students achieve accredited foreign language proficiency at B1 level in order to graduate from university or enrol for some postgraduate courses has prompted changes in language teaching in higher education in Spain. Given the clearly ineffective tuition received at earlier stages of their education, Spanish university students are finding it difficult to meet this new requirement. Society does not see language learning as a priority, and the aforementioned lack of effective teaching places Spaniards in a weak position with regard to language learning. Motivated by the Bologna Process, which seeks to foster the acquisition of multiple skills by students, the B1 requirement comes at the end of students’ education, regardless of what they were actually taught at primary and secondary level. This article examines the perceptions of a group of students enrolled in the master’s degree in secondary teacher training and analyses data on accreditation in general in order to draw relevant conclusions. The article focuses particularly on the options chosen by students at the University of Córdoba in order to meet the new foreign language requirement, and more specifically on the role played by the university’s language centre. Data was collected through a survey based on a validated ad hoc questionnaire.
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