Since the 1970s, Cambodia has faced political turmoil, financial constraints, and social insecurity. With support from the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) (Dy & Ninomiya, 2003), the country sought coordinated international assistance for its economic and educational reconstruction and development (John, 2006, p. 97). This initiative has led to significant transformations within Cambodian society, particularly regarding the importance of the English language.
These transitions have influenced the country’s foreign language policy – the choice of English as its second language (Takeda, 2015, p. 47). There were three main factors that led to this choice. First, the arrival of the United Nations Transitional Authority in Cambodia (UNTAC), has undeniably made Cambodian people regard English as an internationally influential language (Ibid.). Secondly, Cambodia entered into the Association of Southeast Nations (ASEAN) whose official language is English (ASEAN Documents Series 2014, p. 286). As a result, there is pressure on Cambodian representatives as well as the people to develop their English skills so that they can fully partake in the organization. Meanwhile, the most important factor was in 1994, the Law on Investment has attracted billions of dollars of foreign direct investment into the country’s urban centers and surrounding areas (Clayton, 2006, p. 24); this investment that manifests in hundreds of foreign companies established in metropolitan Phnom Penh has significantly impacted the country’s volume and patterns of trade (p. 47). Most of the firms operating in Cambodia from bases in other countries, on the other hand, use English as the language of business communication and require knowledge of English language for managerial-level employees (p. 26). More importantly, it was believed that anyone who can speak English would definitely have more chance to get good jobs, thus making much, or at least enough, money to support their living (IBP, 2016, p. 83).
Cambodian both expressed and acted upon a particular language choice: They had chosen English as their preferred foreign language, and they were making this choice known to university patrons and the Ministry of Education, Youth, and Sport (Clayton,p. 3). For this very reason, most people start learning English; consequently, the number of classes, centers, schools, institutes, and universities very quickly has begun to practice and sprout throughout the nation. Additionally, the Ministry of Education, Youth, and Sport (MoEYS)’s decision in 1996 to begin EFL (English as a Foreign Language) classes in public schools starting in Grade 7 made English even more popular in Cambodia (Takeda, p. 48); and it’s interesting to note that in 2014, MoEYS added English for Grade 6 (2014, p. 25). Hence, English has become the first foreign language and is now taught in schools in Cambodia (Kirkpatrick, 2010, p. 57; Majhanovich, 2013, p. 253).
In 2005, IDP Education (Cambodia) established the Annual CamTESOL Conference Series which is for professionals in the fields of English Language Teaching and related issues, and currently, it has become the premier professional development conference in the Asia Pacific region (The CamTESOL Conference Series, 2016). University of Management and Economics (UME), established in 2000, is one of the majority of universities in Cambodia that offers TESOL or English for Teaching. Its school of Arts, Humanity and Foreign Language provides three differences of English majors such as English for Education (or TESOL), English for Communication and Translation. Since the courses have been offered, the number of students registers for the English programme keeps increasing due to the need of job markets. However, although the quantity has increased, the lecturers’ and the researcher’s observations showed glaring shortcoming in students’ language use, an understanding of which sentences or parts of sentences are appropriate. In short, they lack of communicative competence, especially in spoken English skills.
Therefore, the aims of this study are to determine learning challenges which the TESOL undergraduate students have encountered and the motivation they obtain to accomplish their English proficiency.
