The article is devoted to the issues of developing learner autonomy in the Institutes of Higher Learning (IHL) in Russia as one of the top priorities of higher education in Russia nowadays is to train graduates with a high degree of autonomy, which has been fixed in the state standards of higher education. Foreign languages gain an ever-increasing importance within the framework of qualitative structural changes in the Russian system of higher education. Modern society urgently needs secondary linguistic personalities rather than graduates who merely speak a foreign language to a certain degree. Recent years have seen a growing demand for translators of vocationally-oriented texts, which is a result of globalization, improved cross-cultural relations, economic and political cooperation. Obviously, since students who learn English for specific purposes (ESP) have less time to acquire a foreign language in their curricula compared to those at linguistic universities, they need to develop learner autonomy and work persistently to become real professionals. To meet this demand, nonlinguistic institutes of higher learning are fully engaged in training of such translators. The article is focused on the ways to transform existing techniques, methods and approaches to form the learner autonomy of would-be translators of vocationally-oriented texts. The authors provide the necessary steps to succeed in achieving this goal, a set of various exercises to teach grammar of science language, available elements and resources of the LMS MOODLE as well as the results of experimental training of engineering students. The authors arrive at the conclusion that one of the most efficient and effective ways to succeed in achieving this goal is to build an electronic information educational environment in IHL and work out innovative teaching methods of developing learner autonomy.