UNT faculty members are helping Turkey's Zirve University start an English language program, reinforcing UNT's ongoing global partnerships with institutions of higher education.

Eva Bowman, director of the Intensive English Language Institute at UNT, and five faculty members are training 40 instructors of English at Zirve in a two-week boot-camp there. UNT also is assisting in the development of curriculum, English language diagnostic testing, student placement, instructors' performance reviews and an annual program review.

Officials at Zirve — a newly founded private university that welcomed its first group of students this fall — approached IELI, considered a leader in training for English as a second language, after deciding to create an English language program at the school. Last month, UNT and Zirve signed an agreement in which IELI staff will serve as experts to help establish the program during the 2009-10 academic year.