With the explosion in language teaching, increasing demand for language teachers and the consequent need to train these teachers, the preparation of foreign language teachers has become more important in recent years (Kelly, et al., 2004; Harmer, 2001; Jarvis and Bernhardt, 1987). However, educating qualified English teachers doesn’t seem to be a simple issue since there can be many factors affecting foreign language teacher education at universities (Umbach and Porter, 2002) such as the physical environment of the teacher education institutions, human resources, and the nature of the instruction. The quality of teacher education is affected by the physical learning environment and the quality of instructors at faculties. Curtain and Pesola (1994, cited in Peyton, 1997) propose foreign language teachers today “require a combination of competencies and background that may be unprecedented in the preparation of language teachers” and it is critical to have a strong professional development provided in well-prepared physical learning environment by the qualified instructors. Another important aspect of foreign language teacher education is the nature of the curriculum. Besides foreign language proficiency, the quality of the language teacher depends on professional knowledge in linguistics, literary studies, psychology, pedagogy, sociology, philosophy, and the interpersonal relationships (Marscholleck, 2003; Schrier, 1994; Jarvis and Bernhardt, 1987). Moreover, to reach standards in teacher education, for instance, in European context in order to apply current approaches and applications such as Common European Framework, it is required to have qualified and competent language teachers. To provide these qualifications and competencies, there is a need for evaluation of the quality of the teacher education institutions so that the student satisfaction can be increased, problems can be minimized and better learning environment can be provided. The aim of this study is to investigate the problems of English language teacher education related to the physical environment, human resources, and instructional state of the institutions from the viewpoints of the 4th year prospective English teachers. For this purpose, two research questions were addressed: whether prospective teachers were satisfied with physical learning environment, human resources, and instruction; and the most frequently stated problems in relation to these three dimensions. The participants of the study were 278 4th year prospective English teachers in ELT departments in three universities in Ankara; these universities were Hacettepe University, Gazi University and Middle East Technical University. The subjects of the study were administered a three-part questionnaire composed of 56 items to be rated by the students; and one open-ended question at the end of each part. The data were subjected to descriptive statistical analysis procedures by using the SPSS software. The results of the study proposed that, related to their departments, the prospective teachers had a general satisfaction with its buildings’ meeting their basic needs; instructors’ qualifications and competencies; and the general adequateness of the English teacher education program. Nevertheless, the results obtained from both quantitative and qualitative data also showed that the institutions had important common problems, which also affected the students’ satisfaction levels and attitudes towards teaching English such as language laboratory’s absence, the guidance provided by the instructors, the administration’s support and attitude, and the practice teachings at schools. All these problems are thought to affect the quality of educating English teachers and meeting the certain national standards, and the standards determined by European profile for language teacher education.

The overall design of this research study is survey. The survey questionnaire was developed by the researchers to determine student satisfaction and the problems of English language teacher education. The questionnaire was composed of three dimensions; physical learning environment, the human resources, and the instructional state. At the end of each dimension, there was an open-ended item where students could write their comments. The questionnaire was developed on the basis of an extensive review of literature. Furthermore, it was subjected to factor and reliability analysis. Factor analysis confirmed the assumption of the presence of three dimensions; and internal consistency coefficient for the whole questionnaire was found to be high with a Cronbach alpha coefficient reported of .92. The data were collected from all 4th year prospective English teachers (N=278) in state universities’ teacher education colleges in Ankara. Most of the students were female (n= 216), and 83.3% of the participants (n= 230), were graduates of Anatolian Teacher High School. 96% (n= 266) of students in the whole group ranked their departments among their first five choices in university exam. Descriptive procedures were carried out by making use of SPSS. Additionally, responses to open-ended question were quantitatively analyzed. These data were used strengthen and support the quantitative findings.

It is known that among many factors, institutions’ facilities, culture, and research emphasis; and faculty goes on to be the keenest influences on students’ experiences in their program (Cameron and Ettington, 1988; Hartnett and Centra, 1977 as cited in Umbach and Porter, 2002). For this purpose, the first research question of this study aimed of examining the satisfaction level of the students with physical learning environment, human resources, and the instruction of their departments. In relation to physical environment, findings indicated that most of the students were satisfied with their department’s having basic supplies for basic needs (M=3.00, SD=.75), safety for educational tasks and activities (M=2.87, SD=.80), heating of the buildings. As studies have displayed, student satisfaction have a positive effect on students’ motivation and achievement and identifying and meeting students’ needs and expectations by universities can increase their effectiveness and improve those institutions (Elliott & Shin, 2002; Sohail and Saeed, 2003; Juillerat & Schreiner, 1999). However, they expressed crucial problems which might affect their language and teaching skills. Besides a department library and computer laboratory, most of the students reported that they had no language laboratory (M=1.51, SD=.84) which is thought to help establish a foundation of linguistic habits both for teachers and learners of language (Willis, 1962). The language laboratory, library, and computers might also provide students with the opportunity “to maintain and enhance ongoing personal language competency” (Kelly et al., 2004, p4) Looking at the results related to human resources, it’s noteworthy that students were generally satisfied with the qualifications (M=3.06) and academic competencies (M=2.85) of their instructors. However, the results obtained from the qualitative data showed that the students had problems regarding guidance by instructors. Here, it should be noted, as Dewey (1897) also states “the teacher is not in the school to impose certain ideas or to form certain habits in the human beings”, but he/she is there “to select the influences which shall affect him/her and assist him/her in properly responding to these influences”. For that reason, guidance and personal relationships are of great importance. Moreover, the administration of their departments was another problem under this dimension, students thought that the administrators didn’t provide enough support and resources (M=2.16, SD=.79) besides not being sensitive for students’ expectations. In relation to the instructional state of the departments, while prospective teachers expressed their satisfaction with the program’s quality and the general adequacy of the courses to prepare them for their professions, the analysis of the qualitative data revealed that students criticized the quality of practice teaching activities due to the problems related to the cooperating schools; and the limited number of the courses leading to development of English language skills. As emphasized by the European Profile for Language Teacher education (2004), the curriculum of language teacher education should integrate academic study with practice, for that reason teaching practices, and working with mentors are crucial. As a conclusion, according to 4th year students who are supposed to have enough experience to judge their departments, it was found that, in relation to physical environment, human resources, and the instruction, they were mostly satisfied with basic supplies, safety, and the heating of buildings; instructors’ qualifications and competencies; and the general adequacy of the program while they face problem with the lack of some academic and social facilities such as language laboratory and social spaces for resting and relaxing, administrators’ attitude, guidance by instructors, and the practice teaching activities at cooperating schools. Schools’ being a social institution and representing the real life (Dewey, 1897), all these factors regarded as problematic by the 4th year prospective teachers are known to have a pedagogic function, if improved, to increase student motivation, though not directly student learning. For that reason, the results of the study can contribute to the literature on teacher education and can be used to evaluate the factors affecting satisfaction of the students and problems of the departments on the quality of teacher education. In European context, the institutions dealing with language teacher education should include certain elements to educate language teachers having “key role” in improving foreign language learning.