The digital era generates extremely complex transformative processes in educational institutions, particularly universities worldwide. We are witnessing a transformation of the entire concept of knowledge and the understanding of its purpose and role. The implementation of digital resources and platforms opens up a whole network of possibilities for greater access to knowledge/information and global connectivity among academic communities. Tools such as online libraries, digital databases, digital archives, and various platforms for virtual collaboration are now available to students and educators. However, with this progress come significant challenges and open questions, especially for the social sciences and humanities. These disciplines face a dilemma: will the digital transformation advance or marginalize them? Digital platforms offer advantages in terms of accessibility and innovation, but they also bring dangers. It is inevitable that digital platforms enable faster access to information and innovative teaching approaches, but they also carry numerous risks for the future of education as a whole. There is an increasing trend of pronounced marginalization of the social sciences and humanities, partly as a consequence of the strong focus on STEM disciplines, which are often at the center of attention due to their technological nature and the profit they generate. Moreover, the hegemony of capital-interest trends, which favor technical and market-oriented approaches to education, threatens the traditional mission of universities as spaces for the development and generation of healthy trends in contextual critical thinking. Profit-oriented concepts of education, supported by neoliberal ideology, focus on technological and market-valuable disciplines, while the social sciences and humanities risk being pushed aside. There is a clear trend of favoring various forms/models of hybrid teaching, which combine online and in-person lectures. The loss of physical interaction can negatively affect the development of critical thinking and dynamic discussion in the social sciences and humanities. At universities that have historically been bastions of critical thinking, neoliberal pressures, and direct attacks on critical/liberatory thought are supported by rapidly growing concepts of exclusively profit-oriented paradigms of rationality. Additionally, the digitalization of education and the digital transformation raise the question of the future of the concept of the "knowledge society," which is increasingly being profaned. In this context, the "knowledge society" becomes a concept losing its authenticity, as knowledge is increasingly used as a means for market prosperity, rather than as a tool for the development of broader societal progress. Controlled neoliberal societies, driven by the hegemony of capital-interest trends, increasingly influence the direction of university development, leading to attacks on critical thought.

The COVID-19 outbreak forced many changes in education, including teaching techniques, teacher-student interactions, materials, and assessment practices. The present study aims to uncover students' opinions on the types of exams they took, their evaluation of the testing/ assessment practices they experienced, whether online learning influenced the way they prepared for the exams, whether they would like to keep the testing/assessment practices in the new normal and how they evaluate the teacher's role as an assessor. The data for the study were collected in Türkiye (TUR), the Republic of North Macedonia (RNM), Poland (POL), and Bosnia and Herzegovina (B&H) using cross-culturally valid questionnaires including items asking students to evaluate the teaching, assessment, and interaction skills of their teachers during the first "emergency online teaching semester". Both closed- and open-ended items were included in the data collection tools. Responses to the items in the questionnaires were analysed quantitatively, keeping in mind country and context-specific peculiarities. The study results show similarities in the ways students were evaluated and their perceptions of evaluation procedures during the COVID-19 period, as well as contextual differences in the four countries.

At the beginning of 2020, few people could imagine that the new coronavirus, COVID-19, would impact that many aspects of our lives and change the content, structure, and teaching methods we knew before. Many language teachers (LT) worldwide who had been effectively implementing face-to-face instruction had to make an abrupt transition to online education, something they were not trained for or had experience with. The present study aims to discover whether LT successfully delivered online instruction and whether online teaching during the first online period impacted students’ learning habits. Using a specifically designed questionnaire, students who study at several public universities from Bosnia and Herzegovina (B&H), the Republic of North Macedonia (RNM), and Türkiye (TUR) were asked to evaluate their teachers’ professional adaptation and success during the first “emergency online teaching semester”, and to reflect on their learning habits during this period and the changes they personally experienced. The results of the study revealed that students in the three countries approached and evaluated their teachers’ pedagogical skills as appropriate for online teaching in the first COVID-19 period in remarkably similar ways. However, the impact on students’ learning habits is, to a certain extent, different in these countries. The findings of the study might provide relevant input to rethink the teaching profession in terms of competencies, means of instruction, and strategies for coping with processes that affect teaching. Education will not be the same in a post-pandemic world, we must use the knowledge we have gained, and the suggestions made by our students to enhance our educational systems.

The paper discusses the relationship between assessment in teaching English as a foreign language and students’ competencies. The data collected by this research show that, in recent times, teachers and students are becoming aware that learning based only on the acquisition of facts will not adequately respond to the challenges they will face in the future. An environment in which the learning outcomes are transparently and directly linked to the students’ competencies enables them to take responsibility for their progress, not only during the official period of schooling but also during lifelong learning, which is very important. With this approach, learning outcomes and their connection with the necessary competencies to achieve learning outcomes become the basis for redefining qualifications and curricula in general and professional education. The transparent connection of learning outcomes and necessary competencies to achieve learning outcomes, as well as the shift of focus from teachers to students, enables students to find their way of improving competencies and taking responsibility for their learning. Learning outcomes are best understood by viewing them as a series of valuable processes and opportunities that can be applied in different ways in different areas of teaching and learning. The emphasis is on defining the learning outcomes so that we use the students’ experience and pay less attention to the content of the subjects of a specific curriculum. The data from this research indicate that learning outcomes impact assessment if they are adequately linked to competencies. Students can monitor their progress and take responsibility for it. The primary outcome of this research is that assessment aligned with progress in students’ competencies and their connection to learning outcomes will certainly improve learning.

The popularity of online crowdsourcing platforms was slowly increasing among language learners before the pandemic, but COVID-19 changed the educational systems worldwide. This study aims to uncover whether or not, and if ‘YES’, how the attitudes and habits of language learners concerning the use of crowdsourcing materials in Turkey, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Republic of North Macedonia and Poland changed during the pandemic. To compare the pre-and during the covid crowdsourcing tool usage, the cross-culturally appropriate questionnaire utilised in the pre-COVID-19 period was used again. The collected data were analysed qualitatively and quantitatively to identify the differences between the periods. The study’s findings showed that the shift from face-to-face to online learning significantly affected the development of crowdsourcing platforms worldwide and their employment in the studied countries. The results also demonstrated that a combination of factors, such as reduced interactions with teachers and peers, an increase in workload, and a lack of support on the part of institutions, led to students taking responsibility for their learning. The number and characteristics of the popular platforms changed from country to country since expectations from students varied.

With the COVID-19 outbreak at the beginning of 2020, many language teachers worldwide who were successfully implementing face-to-face teaching had to abruptly switch to online education, which was not something they were trained for or had experience with. Were they successful? The present study asked students from Turkey (TUR), Poland (POL), the Republic of North Macedonia (RNM), and Bosnia and Herzegovina (B&H) to evaluate their teachers’ professional adaptation and success during the first emergency online teaching semester. The results of the study showed that there were important similarities in the ways students in the examined four countries approached and evaluated the level of professionalism of their teachers in the first COVID-19 period regarding their teachers’ computer literacy, online teaching skills, creation of materials appropriate for online teaching.

Book review. Sadia Belkhir (ed.). Cognition and language learning. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing. 2020. Pp. 157.

Online crowdsourcing sites/platforms have become popular in recent years. This study aims to uncover when, where, and how language learners in Turkey (TUR), Poland (POL), Macedonia (MAC), and Bosnia and Herzegovina (B&H) make use of the available crowdsourcing websites/games to learn foreign languages. To ensure parallelism among the data collected in the four countries, a cross-culturally appropriate online questionnaire in English comprised of two parts was designed for this study. Part one gathered information about the use of crowdsourcing sites, tools, and games, while part two elicited background information related to the participants (N=211). The data were analysed considering country- and context-specific variables. The results show that there are more similarities than differences in the ways informants in the studied countries perceive, and employ crowdsourcing resources to learn languages. Therefore, the findings might provide insights for experts, material developers and teacher trainers striving to create cross-culturally valid crowdsourcing platforms/games.