A study on professional development needs of EFL instructors working at a foundation university

The objective of the present study is to analyze professional development needs of EFL instructors at a foundation university in Gaziantep. In order to get a comprehensive idea, different aspects of professional development programs have been focused.First of all, general attitudes of instructors toward professional development programs have been determined and then teachers have been asked to state their professional development needs. In addition to the areas they need development, the reasons that hinder them from attending these programs have been investigated. The last step has been to identify the delivery formats and methods of the program based on instructors? preferences.A hundred EFL instructors consisting of both Turkish and international staff participated in the study. As the data collection tool, a questionnaire was adapted and administrated to instructors. Data that was gathered through a questionnaire and analyzed by means of Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS).The first result which this study revealed was that EFL instructors held positive attitudes for the professional development programs. Sharing experiences and ideas with other colleagues was the most common activity among instructors to develop themselves professionally and the main reason that hindered them from attending these programs was indicated as inconvenient time and date. Productive skills were challenging for most instructors both to teach and to assess. As to delivery formats and methods of the professional development programs, instructors preferred programs to take place at their institution, up to 45 minutes and generally delivered by an expert or trainer outside the institution.