Showcases
Background
The Corporate Presentation initiative is a collaborative effort between the EAC project team and CUHK Business School. Unlike previous initiatives which focused on case competitions, this collaboration is embedded in the IBBA3032 Corporate Project course, where students work directly with industry partners such as EY, Foodpanda, Kao Liese, Kimberly-Clark, Manulife, and Uniqlo.
Corporate presentations require a different level of professionalism and strategic alignment compared with academic presentations. Students must understand stakeholder expectations, align recommendations with business goals, and communicate persuasively in real corporate contexts. This collaboration therefore aims to equip students with the language, structure, delivery skills, and professional awareness needed to perform effectively in high-stakes corporate settings.
Approach
The support provided by the EAC team is both instructional and developmental:
- Corporate Presentation Skills Workshops
- Focus on executive messaging, stakeholder analysis, storytelling, slide design, and professional handling of Q&A.
- Emphasize SMART goals, clear openings and closings, and strong calls to action.
- Introduce best practices for visual design and audience engagement.
- Detailed Mock Presentation Feedback
- Focuses on three key areas:
- Content and Organization (clarity of introduction, logical sequencing, transitions, storytelling)
- Delivery Skills (vocal variety, confidence, pronunciation, energy, gestures)
- Slide Design (reducing text density, improving chart readability, consistency and formatting)
- Focuses on three key areas:
- Corporate Engagement
- The EAC team attends final presentations at corporate partners’ offices.
- Feedback is provided alongside industry professionals, reinforcing real-world communication standards and expectations.
Areas of Support
- Audience analysis and engagement strategies
- Crafting SMART goals and clear presentation structure
- Effective introductions and conclusions
- Storytelling and strategic alignment
- Slide design and visual clarity
- Vocal delivery, confidence, and non-verbal communication
- Professional Q&A handling
- Language precision and persuasive phrasing
Outcomes
The collaboration has received positive evaluations. Students value the clear structural guidance, practical audience engagement strategies, and specific, project-tailored feedback, particularly in storytelling, strategic messaging, slide design, and delivery. Observable improvements are noted in presentation organization, coherence, vocal delivery, and overall executive presence, with students demonstrating greater clarity and confidence in their final corporate presentations.
Background
The collaboration between the EAC project team and the Department of Sports Science and Physical Education (SSPE) started in the summer of 2017. The focus of our collaboration is on research writing; specifically, ongoing support has been provided to empower students to complete research proposals (in the course SPED3630 Introduction to Research Methods) and final-year project reports (in the course SPED4900 Research Project) across two academic years. In addition, the EAC project team has been conducting oral presentation workshops since 2024 to equip students with practical skills needed to successfully present their research projects.
Approach
Needs Analysis: To have a better grasp of the difficulties encountered by the SSPE students in their research writing journey, samples of their research proposals and research reports were collected and analysed. Based on the textual analyses, some common problems related to macro issues (e.g., overall structure and coherence) and micro issues (e.g., language use and citation of references) were identified, which were converted into contextualized teaching materials for the two-part research writing workshops. To effectively plan the oral presentation workshop, students’ in-class presentations were observed by the EAC team, and the training materials were developed based on major problems identified from students’ performance.
Personalized Support: Understanding that research writing is a challenge to many SSPE students, individual feedback was provided to their research proposal draft (in the course SPED3630 Introduction to Research Methods) in an attempt to provide customized support.
The Tailor-made e-Learning Platform: The e-Learning platform for SSPE students has been developed to generate a sustainable and adaptable eLearning framework for virtual writing support, which can hopefully motivate student learning. The content includes the core structure of FYP proposals and reports, writing tips for each section of a research proposal and report, and language tips for scientific research writing. Various interactive and gamified activities were designed to make students’ independent learning experience engaging and enjoyable.
Outcomes
Based on the analysis of students’ research proposal draft submitted to the EAC project team and the final version submitted to the teachers of SPED3630, it was found that they had made significant improvements, especially in the areas of referencing, introduction writing, as well as literature review writing. Meanwhile, students’ presentation performance has also improved throughout these years after the team’s intervention by adding oral presentation skills training.
At the same time, the support from the EAC project team has been highly recognized by the SSPE Department in a sense that students’ participation in the research writing workshops has been made compulsory and specified on the Final-year Project Student Handbook.
Background
The EAC team has been collaborating with Prof Sidharth Jaggi of the Department of Information Engineering since the 2016-17 academic year. Knowing Engineering students often encountered difficulty in English writing and speaking, the EAC team has been offering a series of language support to IE students who work on their Final Year Projects (FYPs) to fulfil the academic programme requirements and the Hong Kong Institute of Engineers (HKIE) attributes.
Approach
Textual/needs analyses: One analysis was conducted on over 100 FYP sample, interim and final FYP reports of previous two academic years, with key findings established in January, 2017. Another analysis was conducted on about 60 FYP group presentation videos and posters of previous two academic years, with key findings established in March, 2017. Based on these analyses, the foci of the two respective workshops were identified.
Tailor-made materials: Two sets of learning materials, including some annotated student works and extracts, guidelines of report writing structure and of poster designing structure, and examples of effective language usage in each section of the report and of the poster, were prepared for the two corresponding workshops.
Trainings for teaching assistants: In 2016–17 academic year, two one-hour training sessions for the content TAs led by Mr Chris Rozendaal and Mr Rickey Lu were held on 18 January and 30 March, 2017 respectively. The former focused on training the TAs about grading FYP reports and giving appropriate feedback to students, while the latter focused on grading posters for FYP presentation and giving appropriate feedback to students. Language rubrics created by the EAC team were introduced to the content TAs as assisting tools.
In 2017-18 academic year, the same session for training new TAs about grading and giving feedback on FYP reports was held again on 6 October, 2017. In addition, elements about FYP proposals and more practical suggestions were provided, and the whole session was lengthened to one and a half hour.
Grading and feedback system: In 2016–17 academic year, the content TAs were responsible for grading and giving feedback on the first two FYP interim reports, and for double-grading the FYP final reports. Prior to the deadlines of grade submission, Mr Chris Rozendaal and the EAC team checked the comments and language marks given by the content TAs, and gave some comments/suggestions to the content TAs about their work. Mr Rozendaal also offered a session of score moderation to help the content TAs with the grading of boundary and problematic cases.
In 2017-18 academic year, the new content TAs are required to grade and give feedback on an FYP (interim) proposal and report, and an FYP final report in each term. Mr Rozendaal and the EAC team have planned to hold a moderation meeting after every due date of students’ reports to facilitate the content TAs’ grading and feedback-giving process.
Workshops for FYP students: In 2016–17 academic year, one compulsory workshop on writing an FYP report in Information Engineering (IE) was held on 18 February, 2017. The second workshop held on and 24 April, 2017, was optional, which focused on designing a poster for FYP poster presentation in IE.
In 2017–18 academic year, the mandatory writing workshop was held again on 9 October, 2017, to brief the new cohort of IE FYP students. In additional, elements about FYP proposals and more practical suggestions were provided. The whole session was lengthened to one and a half hour due to positive requests from students of the previous cohort.
Common objectives of workshops:
- To familiarise students with overall structural conventions normally associated with IE report writing and presentation poster designing
- To help students relate structural elements to section headings in their FYP Reports and poster for presentation
- To give students direction in writing an abstract and a proposal
- To review basic standards of referencing on both a report and a poster
Student feedback survey: Feedback was collected from students through a questionnaire survey immediately after each workshop. Likert scale and open-ended questions focusing on the usefulness of the workshop were used. Suggestions for improving the workshop were also being solicited.
Poster presentation observations: The EAC team attended one session of the interim IE FYP poster presentation in early December, 2016, and another session of the final FYP poster presentation in early May, 2017. Through talking to some groups of students about their proposed projects and studying their posters, the EAC team grasped the language performance and needs of the students. Ideas were incorporated into tailor-made activities and materials so as to help the students improve their skills of presenting project objectives and concepts to both professional audience and laymen.
Interviews with teaching assistants: After a series of EAC supporting activities, the EAC team invited the three content TAs to a one-hour interview for obtaining some first-hand opinions on the students’ language use and performance in FYP report writing, and suggestions for improving the collaboration.
Outcomes
The collaboration model of the EAC team and the Department of IE has been well established within only one academic year. The series of language supporting events have been well-received as reflected in the student feedback surveys. All three content TAs of the previous year shared similar views that they have learnt more about report writing as well as balancing between content and language during the grading process. Therefore, the EAC team will continue to work with Prof Jaggi, the new content TAs and the Department of IE in the 2017-18 academic year. A new series of language supporting events has already been scheduled.
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Background
In the first term of the academic year 2015-16, the EAC project team collaborated with the Department of Statistics in an attempt to enhance students’ language awareness and language use in writing an evaluative report for the course STAT3005 Applied Nonparametric Statistics. These students encountered difficulty in explaining technical information to their target audience.
Approach
Needs Analysis: The task and the mid-term reports of students were analyzed to identify features of an exemplary evaluative report and the students’ areas of improvement. A 20-point rating scale was used to score for the key features of an evaluative report.
Tailor-made Materials: Learning materials, a model text, and some annotated student works were prepared for the invited session to enhance the language awareness of the students.
Feedback: A debriefing session was conducted by the EAC project team during their regular lecture to share the findings with the students. All learning materials and the model text were uploaded to Blackboard for independent learning after class.
Outcomes
The students received remarkably higher language marks in writing the evaluative report in the final examination.
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Background
- Since the 2016–17 academic year, the EAC team has been collaborating with the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences (EESC; formerly known as the Earth System Science Program) to enhance the language awareness and skills of first-year and final-year students for explaining complex science concepts to lay audience, writing research reports, and delivering academic presentations.
Approach
For First-Year Students:
- Needs Analysis: Senior Project reports and research presentations from the previous cohort were analyzed to identify areas for improvement.
- Materials Design: Learning materials on how to give an effective poster presentation were prepared for the guest lecture.
- Guest Lecture: In the first few years, the EAC team delivered a lecture on giving effective poster presentations. All materials were then shared with students for independent post-class study.
- Group Presentation Consultations: Following changes in assessment requirements, the intervention approach shifted to group consultations in recent years. In these sessions, students delivered a mock poster presentation to the EAC team for instant feedback. Previously developed learning materials were assigned as self-study.
For Final-Year Students:
- Needs Analysis: The team analyzed Senior Project reports, posters, and presentation videos to determine key areas for improvement.
- Workshops: A series of language enhancement workshops was conducted to sharpen students’ skills in writing research reports and delivering presentations.
- Individual Consultations: In order to further enhance student learning, the team provided personalized feedback on students’ research report writing, poster designs, and academic presentations during individual consultation sessions.
- eLearning Platform: To consolidate these efforts and facilitate student self-study, the team developed eLearning modules, supplemented by exemplary journal articles written by EESC professors.
- Assessment Rubrics: EESC adopted the FYP assessment rubrics designed by the EAC team; these rubrics also factor in scores from the team’s accompanying eLearning exercises.
Outcomes
Over the past decade of collaboration, the working model between the EAC team and EESC has become highly integrated and effective. Both the consultations and eLearning materials have been well-received, as reflected in student feedback surveys.
EAC Team
Mr. Adam Fingrut, The School of Architecture
Mr. Johnson Chan, English Language Teaching Unit
Ms. Martha Ng, English Language Teaching Unit
Dr. Olive Cheung, English Language Teaching Unit
Advisor
Dr. Jose Lai
Background
Since the academic year 2024-25, the EAC team has collaborated with the School of Architecture to provide the Covert Approach to Delivering English for Specific Purposes (CAD-ESP) intervention in the form of pin-ups for Architecture students. The intervention initially supported Master of Architecture students. It has evolved to helping undergraduate Architecture students.
Approach
Needs Analysis: The School of Architecture has identified a crucial gap in Architecture students’ training – their ability to communicate their designs in an informal and spontaneous manner, as the lack of architectural oracy limits students’ ability to communicate with their peers, other Architecture professionals and critics in different settings.
Materials Design: The EAC team worked with the School of Architecture to design a series of custom interactive activities taking the form of the pin-up to afford students the opportunity to practice architectural discourse and oracy.
Pin-ups: The pin-ups are operated by the Architecture instructors, without the presence of the language teachers. This covert approach is designed to preserve the look and feel of the pin-up while structured in a way that provides students with an authentic studio setting to practice architectural discourse.
Outcomes
Our studies indicate that CAD-ESP can contribute to the development of students’ architectural oracy. Through participating in the series of pin-ups, students are able to practise articulating and defending their architectural priorities and design decisions. Their presentation skills had improved; their use of architectural vocabulary had been enhanced as measured by lexical density; their ability to use architectural discourse and construct design arguments had also improved.
Publication
Chan, M. L., Fingrut, A., Cheung, Y. Y. O., & Ng, M. (2026). Impact of CAD-ESP: Extending a covert intervention approach for the enhancement of Architecture students’ disciplinary oracy. The Asian Journal of Applied Linguistics, 10(4), 1561. https://doi.org/10.25442/hku.33364215
