BALEAP PIM: EAP and the Academy in the Age of GenAI: Implications for practices and practitioners

Register here!

To register for the PIM, please visit the 'upcoming events page' on the BALEAP website, or follow this link. Registration is open until 11th June, and attendance costs £25 for BALEAP members (£40 for non-members).

Programme

We are delighted to share the programme and look forward to seeing presenters and participants online.

 

PIM aims and theme 

A consensus is building that EAP practitioners and centres cannot ignore developments in generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) technologies. The University of Leeds’ Language Centre proposes this BALEAP PIM on the implications of developments in GenAI technologies for practices and practitioners in EAP, and in turn, how EAP practitioner knowledge and insights concerning academic practices, discourse and language can inform critical uses of GenAI across the wider university context.  

The PIM will be an opportunity for members of the EAP community to share their ongoing or recent research and/or scholarship in this area, as well as for the dissemination of good practices that they are developing. 

We welcome any proposals that fit the theme above. Particular areas of interest may be: 

• Implications of developments in GenAI for teaching, learning and assessment policies and practices, as informed by EAP perspectives. 

• Implications of developments in GenAI for scholarship and research in EAP  

• EAP perspectives on ethics and GenAI in the academy 

• EAP perspectives on social justice and GenAI in the academy 

An online PIM 

Acknowledging that many EAP practitioners and centres are currently facing significant financial and institutional constraints, we wished to allow as many colleagues as possible to participate in the PIM. The PIM will, therefore, be hosted online by the University of Leeds’ Language Centre. Benefits of a fully online event include increased accessibility, reduced environmental impact, and a more inclusive space for neurodivergent practitioners.  

While most of the PIM will be ‘live’, we will also welcome proposals for pre-recorded presentations, thus widening potential participation.  

 

Opportunities for first-time presenters 

Those who are relatively new to EAP are currently facing particular challenges. Therefore, we would especially welcome proposals from those who have not previously presented at PIMs or other academic events, or who have limited experience of this. We are able to offer mentoring and support through the submission and preparation process for a number of such presenters. Please contact [email protected] for more information.   

Formats 

The following range of formats will be considered: 

• Pre-recorded presentations (maximum of 15 minutes) 

• Live presentations (20 minutes plus 10 minutes for questions).  

• Workshops (30 minutes, at least 15 minutes of which should involve active participation from attendees).  

Call for contributions 

Please use this Form to submit a proposal. The deadline for submissions is midday, Monday 13th April 2026. Please use [email protected] to contact the PIM organising committee with any questions. We look forward to seeing many of you at the PIM! 

Plenary speakers

Professor Feng (Kevin) Jiang: Dissecting AI Discourse: How it differs and why it matters for EAP 

This talk addresses the challenges and opportunities generative artificial intelligence presents for English for Academic Purposes. Drawing on corpus-based comparisons of AI-generated and human-authored academic texts, I examine systematic differences in phraseology, discourse organisation, and stance. Although AI produces fluent and lexically varied prose, its discourse displays distinctive tendencies towards structural regularity, formulaicity, and a reduced projection of epistemic negotiation and authorial presence. Human writers, by contrast, more frequently demonstrate rhetorical positioning, evaluative nuance, and persuasive risk-taking. I argue that these differences are pedagogically consequential because they illuminate how academic voice, credibility, and reader engagement are constructed. Building on these findings, the talk outlines practical implications for EAP pedagogy, including classroom and after-class activities designed to strengthen rhetorical awareness, academic literacy, and students’ capacity to engage critically with AI tools. By repositioning AI from a writing substitute to a pedagogical resource, I propose instructional approaches that help students interrogate, adapt, and strategically collaborate with AI, supporting the development of more reflective, rhetorically aware academic writers. 

Kevin Jiang is Professor of Applied Linguistics in the School of Foreign Languages at Beihang University, China. He received his PhD from the University of Hong Kong under the supervision of Professor Ken Hyland. His research and teaching focus on disciplinary discourse, academic writing, and corpus-based analysis. He has published five books and over 100 research articles on the above topics in most major SSCI- and CSSCI-indexed journals in applied linguistics. He serves on the editorial boards of the Journal of English for Academic Purposes, English for Specific Purposes, and Teaching in Higher Education, and is recognised as a Highly Cited Scholar by Elsevier, Stanford, and CNKI rankings. 

Professor Sarah Howard: The emerging divides: Examining GenAI use in Higher Education and the role of the University

While new artificial intelligence (AI) tools, specifically generative artificial intelligence (genAI), have been with us for several years now, we continue to grapple with their role in teaching and learning. In higher education, this phenomenon has its own complexities, which have been dominated by concerns about academic integrity, literacy and writing. A marked trend in the area has been difficulty making appropriate use of genAI tools clear to students, to support their learning. The tensions between affordances of these tools and risks are shaping how students engage with, and are able to take advantage of, these tools for learning and how learning is designed. In this talk, we will explore some of these tensions through a study of 194 undergraduate students’ understanding, knowledge, experience and intended use of GenAI tools to support their academic study. Results from this study identified three distinct profiles of students’ use and experience with genAI tools, and their intention to use these in their academic work. Trends suggest that some students are systematically opting to not use genAI, because of lack of clear guidance about appropriate use from the university. This is resulting in a new digital divide, in the use of genAI. These findings point to the importance of universities, and other educational institutions, taking leadership in this area to support students’ development of ‘good practice’ using genAI tools. Further, drawing on a second study of opportunities and conditions of AI-use in learning, these initiatives should take a future-focused view of AI integration to prepare students for the changing and evolving landscape of work and learning through AI-tools. The dual role of universities in preparing students for an increasingly AI‑mediated world while maintaining standards of academic integrity and quality will be explored.

Sarah Howard came to the University of Leeds in 2025, to the position of Chair of Digital Education and Lead of the Centre for Research in Digital Education. Prior to that, she had been at the University of Wollongong, outside of Sydney, in Australia. Before academia, she was the Chair of Fine Arts in a high school in San Franscisco, CA. She taught painting, graphic design and sculpture. She was also a member of the Technology Department, where she first started to work with teachers to support technology integration in their classes. She has 20+ years of experience researching the adoption of digital technologies, by teachers, in schools and higher education. Her work draws significantly on action and collaborative research approaches, with a strong sociological underpinning. Her driving questions focus on how we can make digital technologies meaningful for teachers and students, in different learning contexts. To do this, she looks to employ new digital approaches to research, such as data science methods, new digital technologies and new ways to think about educational data.