Members of AAELTA are delighted with the news that we have become an affiliate of TESOL. It is a dream come true. We have had a very good link with the International Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign Language (IATEFL). We have always wanted to have a similar link with TESOL because these two are the leading international organizations when it comes to English language teaching.

AAELTA’s members meet every 2 weeks on Saturdays to discuss issues related to English language teaching. Members truly believe in professional development. We sometimes invite experienced professionals in the field to give us workshops and training. Most of the time we the members take turns to share our experience. At the moment we have 100 members, and out of these 50 are active members. Our members have represented the association at IATEFL’s annual conferences nearly every year for the past 5 years.

On February 23, 2013, we are going to celebrate AAELTA’s first anniversary since we became a legal association. Two-hundred-fifty English teachers are invited for the event. As part of the celebration, 10 AAELTA members are going to give training on different topics during the event. Every time we have an event like this, the number of our members increases. We held an annual conference for the fifth time last April.

AAELTA members have started helping other English teachers in Ethiopia to set up an association. Two very good examples for this are the newly formed English teachers’ associations in Awassa (a city in southern Ethiopia) and Bahir Dar (a city in northern Ethiopia). These associations consider AAELTA as a very good model. This is our vision: to see many English language teachers meeting up regularly and sharing their experience to their fellow teachers.

We are looking forward to working closely with TESOL in the future.

Dr. Christine Coombe, TESOL president, giving a workshop to AAELTA

AAELTA

AAELTA Saturday Session

Abayneh Haile is a freelance English language teacher based in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. He has CELTA from International House Durban, South Africa. He is serving as president of Addis Ababa English Language Teachers’ Association since January 2012. He has taught English at all levels for 10 years. He has recently started giving a variety of teacher training courses. He is currently working as a part-time trainer at the British Council.