‘I’M GETTING THERE’: AN INVESTIGATION OF ACADEMIC WRITING DEVELOPMENTS OF UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS IN A FOREIGN BRANCH CAMPUS IN MALAYSIA

Many foreign university branch campuses in Malaysia make it compulsory for students to undertake academic literacy units (i.e. Reading for Academic Purposes, Technical Report Writing) in order to equip them with language skills as well as reading and writing for academic purposes. Despite the ubiquitousness of such units in universities, little is known about their effectiveness. This longitudinal study aims to address this gap. This paper reports on data collected from the first phase of a mixed methods study that seeks to explore (i) students’ self-concept in academic writing, (ii) perceived impact of the Academic Writing (AW) unit on the writing development and (iii) the transferability of skills to other academic units. Findings from the questionnaire revealed that the AW unit had a significant positive impact on their writing skills and that the skills acquired were reported to be highly transferable to other study units. Nevertheless, to ensure academic success, the study concludes that the foundations for first year studies need to be laid early. Keywords: academic writing, L2 writing, academic language-learning needs, language learning, English for academic purposes (EAP)