Students - General Information

Admission requirements and commencement of studies

English Philology may be studied as a main subject leading to the BA and MA degrees by anyone who has successfully completed their education at a Finnish secondary school (lukio) – or achieved a comparable standard within an educational system offered in another country – and passed the University of Oulu's annual competitive entrance examination. It may also be studied as a subsidiary (minor) subject by students already enrolled at the University of Oulu for some other main subject, but only after they have successfully passed a separate entrance examination arranged annually in the spring for their benefit; applicants should sign up for this examination through WebOodi by the annually specified date. The examinations for both main-subject and subsidiary-subject entry are usually held in May or June. Once a student has been granted permission to study English Philology either as a main subject or as a subsidiary subject, the registration status of ‘main subject' or ‘subsidiary subject' remains in force until officially changed through official university channels.

Course schedules are posted at the beginning of each semester on the English Philology notice board as well as through the mailing list `eng-students´, to which one may subscribe at http://lists.oulu.fi). In planning their studies, it is important for students to note that several courses start at the beginning of the autumn semester and extend over the entire academic year. Moreover, some courses are compulsory (and students must take them) while some courses are ‘elective', i.e. students may choose them, if they wish, in order to make up the total number of study points necessary to complete their final degree. However, it should be noted that not all elective courses are offered every year. Because of restrictions on the number of participants for particular courses, it is absolutely essential that students who wish to attend a particular course sign up for it through WebOodi before the deadline set for enrolment.

English Philology

English today enjoys a special status as the global language. It is written, spoken and understood throughout the world and has become the most important medium not only for international communication of all sorts (casual and informal, commercial and industrial, political and diplomatic, etc.) but also for the dissemination of scientific and scholarly research. This high status of English throughout the world requires high standards for the teaching of English on many different levels. The curriculum for English Philology is therefore designed to address these requirements and to offer a carefully graded mix of courses focussing on the four core areas of English Philology: Language Skills, Linguistics, Literature and Culture.

Study guidance

The lecturer assigned to offer students study guidance (tel. +358-8-553 3286) and the administrative staff responsible for English Philology (tel. +358-8-553 3400) are always glad to advise students on their studies. Students are urged to contact them particularly at the beginning of each semester for information on new course opportunities, visiting guest lecturers, and other developments within the area of English Philology. Naturally enough, members of the teaching staff are also happy to answer questions relating to their own courses and fields of expertise.

For additional study guidance, first-year students also have the benefit of the student tutoring system (pienryhmäohjaus), supplemented, when the need arises, by information sessions on special topics.

It is essential that students taking English Philology as their main subject explore the opportunities for completing their degree – and, in particular, any requirements concerning subsidiary and general subjects – as soon as possible: preferably within their first year at the university. Although the staff (and especially those who have been assigned as teacher tutors) are willing to offer guidance and advice on this matter, students must in the end take responsibility for their own choices.

Employment prospects

Employment prospects for students graduating with a degree in English Philology have been highly favourable for a number of years. The overwhelming majority of graduates have found employment in the fields of either teaching or information technology, and it is clear that the near future will see an increase in the demand for fully-qualified teachers of English. But beyond these two career paths the growing importance of English in the global community means that job opportunities for graduates in English Philology are widening all the time within a large number of other spheres, including publishing, the media, translation, business, tourism and the leisure industry.

Practical information

All students must register at the Student Services Office when starting at the University and renew their registration annually thereafter, ensuring that their contact information is always up to date. Responsibility for student services within the Faculty is shared between different offices. Information regarding these matters may be found on the notice boards and websites of both the Faculty and English Philology.

Assessment methods vary from course to course: for example, some courses require regular attendance and the regular submission of homework or coursework, while other courses are assessed by a final written examination.

Formal written examinations, including so-called ‘book exams', can only be taken on those dates listed in the examination schedule issued by English Philology. This examination schedule, together with the prescribed reading lists for the book exams, is made available at the beginning of every semester. Students wishing to take a written examination on courses, topics and/or books which are not specified on the examination list and/or on the reading list posted at the beginning of each semester should consult the person designated as being responsible for the course well in advance.

Students must register for formal exams by signing up in WebOodi at least ten days before the date of the examination in question. Students may cancel their registration in the period leading up to the 10-day deadline but may not do so afterwards.

All examinations and courses are graded either numerically (0-5) or simply as pass/fail.

On completion of their studies, all students, regardless of whether they are registered within the main subject or subsidiary subject areas in English Philology, are awarded an overall final grade which is weighted separately from each of the three study packages in English Philology: Basic Studies, Intermediate Studies and Advanced Studies. In order to proceed from Intermediate Studies to Advanced Studies, students must first gain an overall grade for Intermediate Studies and achieve at least the designation ‘good' (= 3) as well as a grade of 3 or more for their Candidate's Thesis.

Students must ask the administrative staff responsible for English Philology to enter the final grades for each of these three levels individually and separately in their official university student records, preferably immediately upon completion of each package.

It should be noted that the final grade for each study package is based on the weighted average of course grades achieved at that particular level. Every course grade is first multiplied by the number of study points that the particular course is worth and the resulting ‘weighted’ grade is then added to the other similarly weighted course grades. Finally, the total obtained in this way is divided by the number of study points credited to courses weighted in this way. (Notice that this system applies only to weighted courses: the number of study points credited to pass/fail courses within a particular study package plays no role in the calculation of the overall final grade.)

(Students should note that the two study programmes, ‘English Philology' and ‘Area Studies and the Anglophone World', are separate independent programmes. Courses which are studied and awarded credit as part of one programme cannot be used to gain credit in the other.)

Learning objectives at different levels

The Basic Studies package in English Philology provides a four-fold overview of the field, comprising: (1) a series of courses designed both to improve practical language skills and strengthen theoretical knowledge of the structures of English, (2) a foundation in applied linguistics, (3) an introduction to literature in English, and (4) a grounding in the basics of British or North American culture. These courses also familiarise students with the main modes of teaching and learning encountered in the university: lectures, seminars, tutorials, examinations and writing assignments.

The teaching programme is planned so that students with English Philology as their main subject can comfortably complete the 25-point Basic Studies package within one academic year and yet find time to accumulate other essential course credits from other courses, such as compulsory general studies courses, and even subsidiary subject courses.

Students taking English Philology as a subsidiary subject may wish to devote more than a year to the completion of their Basic Studies, and in such cases it is again essential to note that some courses start only in the autumn semester and continue in the spring semester, and that the prerequisites in some programmes demand a sequential ordering of courses.

The Intermediate Studies package in English Philology is designed with two goals in mind. First, by virtue of its combination of compulsory and elective courses, it extends students' understanding of the key areas of English Philology while allowing at the same time some room for the development of personal interests. Second, through its training in the basic skills of research methodology and presentation, it leads students majoring in English Philology, to the Candidate's Seminar and Thesis. And this in turn allows them – when all the other requirements have been fulfilled – to take the Candidate's Degree (the BA degree). Alternatively, for minor subject students, completion of the Basic and Intermediate Studies packages may be used to fulfil the requirements for a Candidate's degree in a subject other than English Philology.

The Advanced Studies curriculum encourages students to broaden their skills as well as their knowledge base and to learn to apply them to increasingly specific tasks. These goals are especially important in the Seminar and Thesis Workshop, which make up the core of the Advanced Studies package, equipping students with the formal and intellectual skills that are necessary for independent study and the writing of their Master's Thesis (their Pro Gradu Thesis). The wide range of elective courses at this level is specifically designed to allow students more opportunities to pursue their own subject interests. It should be noted, however, that elective courses are dependent on teaching resources and that the provision of courses on particular topics varies from year to year.

Students of English Philology are encouraged to exploit the opportunities for exchange studies at partner universities abroad within e.g. the Erasmus and ISEP programmes. For more information concerning these partnerships, the variety of different courses available at these partner universities, and the transfer to Oulu University of course credits obtained abroad, please consult the exchange coordinator.

Visiting lecturers from partner universities abroad regularly come to Oulu and offer a variety of short courses at a variety of levels. Like other elective options, these courses are (necessarily) not listed alongside the mandatory course descriptions below and students therefore need to keep themselves informed of the opportunities for taking these courses by checking regularly with the noticeboard and web pages for English Philology.

Students who have completed their Master's degree may pursue further postgraduate studies leading to the degrees of Licentiate and/or PhD in English Philology. Research currently being undertaken within the department covers a wide variety of fields in both linguistics and literature. Within the area of applied linguistics, particular attention has recently been paid by students to discourse and conversation analysis, language learning and teaching, translation, multimodality, computational stylistics and corpus studies of English relating to contact-induced variation and change (particularly with respect to English and Finnish in contact). Within literary studies, research has recently focussed particularly on the areas of imagology, renaissance studies, and area studies (with a special emphasis on Anglophone literature and culture). The doctoral programme in English Philology works in cooperation with other doctoral programmes within the Faculty of Humanities.

Attendance at classes

English Philology regards contact-tuition in 'real-time' as indispensable to the maintenance of proper standards in the award of study-credit in English philology at all levels. It therefore requires its students to fulfil attendance requirements on courses where practice-group, seminar and web-forum sessions are stipulated as an integral part of instruction.

• On courses where students have signed to attend a particular group, they are expected to attend from the first session onwards, and to notify the course-teacher in advance of any absences.
• Registering for a course implies a commitment on the part of the students to fulfil the attendance requirements. Commitments which subsequently prevent the students from fulfilling these requirements cannot be accepted under any circumstances as a basis for getting credit for the course with reduced attendance.
• In cases of unavoidable absence from particular sessions (for instance, because of illness or personal emergency), students must notify the course-teacher and, wherever possible, must arrange to attend another group on the same course, where the same or similar topics are being covered. In these situations it is the students' own responsibility to contact the course-teacher and make such arrangements .
• Circumstances which will prevent the students, once enrolled, from completing the attendance requirements for a particular course (such as supervening military service, maternity leave, chronic or longer-term illness) must oblige the students to withdraw from the course, and to enrol again later, as and when they can fulfil the attendance requirements.
• Absences which have not been compensated for by attendance at a parallel group are a matter for the discretion of the course-teacher, but under no circumstances may the students be accepted for examination, or may credit be granted for any contact-taught course where absence exceeds 20% of the total stipulated contact-time.
  

Language training

Students in English Philology are required at the advanced studies level to spend a period of time in an English-speaking country. The aim of this compulsory residence abroad is to develop the language skills of students as well as to introduce students to the ways of life and the cultural environments of the English-speaking world.

The number of credit points awarded (4 pts) for this time abroad is equivalent either to at least a three-week or four-week period of study or to a two-month period of residence in an English-speaking country. Students who have spent the required period of time in an English-speaking country prior to the commencement of their studies in the department should consult the lecturer in charge of study guidance to find out whether this previous stay qualifies as an acceptable way to earn credit for this language training unit.

For more information about studying in the University of Oulu, see the Prospectus of the Faculty of Humanities (in Finnish only).