Kurdish EFL Undergraduates’ Academic Writing: Discussing the Main Writing Difficulties and Potential Solutions

Abstract

English as a Foreign Language (EFL) lecturers in the Kurdistan Region - Iraq (KRI) often report poor academic essay quality among Kurdish EFL undergraduates. The purpose of this study was therefore to determine the challenges and difficulties Kurdish English-majoring undergraduates encounter in their academic writing. Through writing 60 essays by the undergraduates in three public universities in KRI and interviewing 12 lecturers, we explored writing difficulties and potential suggestions to enhance undergraduates’ writing skills. We found that students made numerous grammatical, spelling, and capitalization errors. Additionally, many of the students also struggled to write proper introduction and conclusion paragraphs in their essays. The outcomes of this article suggest that students need to read more frequently and organize their ideas for effective writing. Suggesting university programmes, various ways of teaching by lecturers in EFL classes, and writing modules were the most repetitive recommendations by the interviewees meant to enhance students’ academic writing skills. Practical implications, Limitations, further research considerations, and implications are discussed in the article.