Affiliate News - 06/09/2023 (Plain Text Version)
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NILETESOL EXPERIENCES AND REFLECTIONS
NileTESOL is a professional association for all those individuals who are actively involved in the development of the teaching of English and teaching content in English in Egypt and globally. NileTESOL is funded and supported by The American University in Cairo’s School of Continuing Education "AUC-SCE". It is a non-profit teacher association that has some key partners, including the American University in Cairo’s School of Continuing Education, the Regional English Language Office "RELO" at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo, British Council Egypt, and AMIDEAST Egypt. It is an affiliate of TESOL International in the USA and IATEFL in the UK. NileTESOL disseminates its news and updates through its website niletesol.org. NileTESOL's constitution is of five sections and nineteen articles. For more than 25 years, NileTESOL has helped to sustain English language teacher development. It conducts face-to-face and online events in and outside Cairo and the NileTESOL-AUC annual conference every January at AUC New Cairo Campus. It distributes TESOL and IATEFL memberships as well as FELT and FELT-YL scholarships; promotes RELO Cairo Mentor Program; and publishes the NileTESOL newsletter and NileTESOL-AUC conference proceedings. It currently has nine Special Interest Groups Committee or SIGs. In addition, NileTESOL has signed off and acted upon memoranda of understanding with various teacher associations. For years, it has helped to meet English language teachers' changing professional development needs related to education technology, inclusive education, and assessment. Notably, it provided online teacher development opportunities for more language teachers during the challenging time of the coronavirus pandemic. In January 2018, I was elected as a member of NileTESOL Board of Directors. For five years, I have taken some ELT community service voluntary roles that have helped develop my different experiences. As NileTESOL International Relations Committee Chair, I have communicated with TESOL, IATEFL, and other teacher associations to recruit more members and promote collaboration. As NileTESOL SIGs Committee Chair, I worked with different SIGs to organize and deliver free face-to-face and online free sessions for teachers. As NileTESOL Membership Committee Chair, I promoted and tracked NileTESOL free, new, and renewal memberships. As NileTESOL President-Elect 2020, President 2021 and Past-President 2022, I worked with NileTESOL Board of Directors, key partners, and teachers’ associations. Through my engagement, I have helped provide more teacher development opportunities and support teacher associations' collaboration. I have also presented and represented NileTESOL at face-to-face and online events and conferences such as Africa ELTA Conference and TESOL International Convention. These experiences have helped develop my leadership skills and allowed me to network with more language teachers and educators. They have helped link NileTESOL with more teacher associations in different parts of the world and encouraged and prepared more new leaders to join and serve NileTESOL. I have served my NileTESOL presidency term at a challenging time when the coronavirus pandemic affected life, education, language teaching, and teacher development everywhere. In 2021, NileTESOL shifted to conduct the Board of Directors' monthly online meetings as well online SIG sessions. In addition, NileTESOL signed and enacted more memoranda of understanding with TESOL Libya, TESOL Kuwait, Mexico TESOL, TESOL Spain, Argentina TESOL, IATEFL Poland, and Cyprus TEA. NileTESOL Board of Directors and SIGs helped to start and build upon more teacher associations' collaboration by developing more networking using online platforms and remote communication. NileTESOL conducted its first virtual annual conference and published its newsletter and NileTESOL-AUC conference proceedings. More Egyptian and foreign English language teachers and educators attended the virtual conference and developed their language teaching experiences and networks. Through many programs and initiatives before, during, and after the Covid-19 pandemic, NileTESOL has helped further teachers’ professional development especially in hybrid instruction using synchronous and asynchronous lessons. These activities have also developed teachers and teacher association leaders to use education technology to meet different changing and challenging needs. Finally, they have helped to generate more new leaders and more remote communication among teacher associations everywhere. I have observed that other teacher associations have also benefitted from their efforts in the past few years. English language teachers everywhere are now better equipped with using technology to deliver synchronous and asynchronous lessons and sessions. Many English language teacher associations throughout the world have succeeded in planning and delivering different online courses, programs, and scholarships for their members to develop their online instruction, formative assessment, and digital literacy. Many have successfully planned and conducted webinars and virtual conferences as well as developed online journals and remote collaboration. With these experiences, the future may see more hybrid instruction and hybrid teacher development and collaboration across regions and borders. More hybrid courses, programs, scholarships and opportunities will likely be offered. There may be more face-to-face and online professional learning communities of English language teachers and educators. These will help develop teachers' accountability of their teaching and focus on student learning as teachers "work together to analyze and improve their classroom practice" (DuFour, 2014; Johnson & Ridley, 2004). To conclude, my NileTESOL leading roles have helped me develop different personal and professional experiences related to communication, collaboration and leadership. Teacher development has always been the key focus for individual teachers and teacher associations. There are different modes of English language teaching and opportunities for teacher associations when they are responsive to change and take context into consideration. References DuFour, Richard. (2004). What is a Professional Learning Community? The Journal of Educational Leadership, 61(8), 1-7. Johnson, B., & Ridley, C. (2004). The elements of mentoring. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan. Samir Omara has been an English language teacher and teacher trainer for the Ministry of Education and Technical Education since 1998. He presented at ILACE, Africa ELTA, TESOL, and BETT. He received he UK Professional Achievement and TESOL Leadership Mentoring Program awards. He was the Head of Professional Development for Teachers First Egypt and NileTESOL President. |
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