I first met English teachers from Cuba when Adita Chiappy President of GELI (Grupo Especialistas en Lengua Inglesa), the Cuban TESOL affiliate, and her late husband Tony Irizar, President of the Linguistics Association of Cuba, spoke at the TESOL Amigos de Cuba Forum at the International TESOL Convention in 2012. Their talk was mesmerizing. Due to the U.S. policy of an embargo on Cuba, it was not easy for Adita and Tony to get visas to attend and while they had attended a TESOL convention in the mid 80s –it had taken years before they were able to obtain visas and gain sponsorship to attend again. Their presentation filled me with hope in the power of international exchanges of English teachers at the face to face, grassroots level. There was so much interest on the part of us in the audience at that forum—from those who had already visited Cuba to those who like me who had never gone to Cuba before.

Group photo: 23^rd A group of attendees from the GELI Convention gather together in Havana, Cuba, December 14-16, 2017.

While I had never gone to Cuba, I had had a long standing interest in Cuba and was eager to go. As an undergraduate student I had read many books about the Cuban revolution in 1959 against Batista (Zeitlin, 1970) and was inspired by their literacy campaigns and their medical doctors and health care system. One of my cousins and a number of friends visited Cuba as part of the Venceremos Brigade—a group of young people from the U.S. who had gone to Cuba to cut sugar cane. I have also been interested in race, politics and identity in Cuba from Chinese to LGBT to Afrocuban literature, music and culture (Perez Sarduy & Stubbs, 1993). At the Amigos de Cuba Forum, Adita and Tony spoke about the history of TESOL methodology and English Language Teaching in Cuba since the 1960s and described the challenges they faced when many of the English professors left Cuba as well the challenges in gaining support for their work of doing outreach to English teachers in rural areas (Irizar Valdes & Chiappy Jhones, 2012). Due to the problems between the U.S. and Cuban governments in obtaining visas, in gaining support to travel and the embargo between the U.S. and Cuba their attendance at the International TESOL Convention was an extraordinary achievement—they were truly ambassadors.

In 2016 many of us in the U.S. were encouraged when President Obama traveled to Cuba, hoping that there would be a lifting of the embargo on trade between the two countries as well as lifting of restrictions on tourism and travel. However, in June of last year, President Trump announced a reversal of Obama’s policy and called for increased restrictions on travel (Merica, 2017). When the call came out for the 23rd Annual Cuban English Language Specialists conference of GELI (Grupo Especialistas en Lengua Inglesa), the Cuban TESOL affiliate, in Havana December 14-16th, my colleague Dr. Rachel Grant from City University of New York Staten Island and I were eager to go.

Dr. Rachel Grant, City University of New York- College of Staten Island, delivered an insightful plenary.

The theme of the conference was “Keys to professional success” and in plenaries and conference papers a number of common themes emerged. Dr. Luis Mijares Nunez from the Rafael Ma. de Mendive University delivered a plenary address “Oral Communication Strategies and a Comprehensive Education.” I was particularly struck by his insistence that as educators we have a social and moral responsibility. I saw many parallels between his approach to pedagogy and philosophical stance and between Rachel Grant’s plenary on assessment and my own talk “Dialogic Approaches to Teaching to the Whole Person” to address the needs of the learners where they are and to see the intergenerational responsibility of more senior professors and teacher educators to model transformative pedagogy and serve as an example and to mentor and promote the leadership of younger generation teachers—teaching to the whole person goes beyond teaching knowledge, but it also encompasses caring for emotional, artistic and ethical growth and development.

From left to right: Rosa M. Jordan School of Foreign Languages, University of Havana; Mariam Lopez, Prof. Pedagogical University, President Adita Chiappi; Patricia Sanchez Penabad, Professor of English and Student at the Pedagogical University deliver an engaging panel at the conference.

A number of presentations addressed the teaching of grammar. Maria de la C. Smith Batson and Dr. Elvira Alonso Hernandez from the University of Las Tunas focused on principles of profession orientation, focusing on oral interaction. Armando Hernandez Vizoso and Azel Gari Dias from MSc. Pedagogical University presented activities on the present perfect based on innovative analysis of the semantic and pragmatic uses of the present perfect. Julian Hernandez Angulo, their professor from JSc Pedagogical “Enrique Jose Varona” presented on lesson planning. Presenter after presenter took up the importance of being open-minded, flexible, reflexive and collaborative. One conference participant shared, “In my opinion, the most important keys for a teacher--of any language and of any subject-- is to be ready for learning throughout life, and doing so aiming at the satisfaction of the students’ needs, and not at your own wish to know more.” Others discussed interdisciplinary approaches, creativity and respect for diverse points of view. It was also encouraging for me to meet others from Cuba, Canada and the U.S. who shared a commitment to further international educational exchanges, particularly at the grassroots level-- classroom to classroom, school to school and university to university. I came away enriched by conference participant insights and invigorated in learning about more international and global perspectives to social justice.

Edwardo Escalona Pardo, Peter Ruffner, Pantoja Tamayo and Gloria Ward collaborate together on their upcoming projects at the conference. (For more on their work see this article.)

I was struck by the hospitality of the conference organizers who had very little in material resources but made up through flexibility, creativity and organization. For example, they had one projector to project slide shows and had to borrow another for the whole conference. And in the business meeting it was put forward that the proceeds from the conference would go towards purchase of a new projector for GELI. The elevator in one of the buildings we met in was not in service and the staircase was not handicap friendly. None the less, students cheerfully assisted me by carrying my bags and taking my arm up step and down stairs with my arthritic knees. One conference attendee Dr. Vilma V Borrero Ochoa presented a paper for a colleague who had had a family emergency and could not attend. She had memorized his presentation on Sociocultural Features in English Language Teaching as well as her own on guiding student research. When we had the opportunity to have lunch together she shared with me that she became blind as a mature adult in recent years. Initially the adjustment to losing her sight made her want to retire from teaching, but her colleagues went to her home and insisted that she come back and encouraged her to continue to teach!

Another example of commitment to the profession and deep desire for professional development and collaboration was the commitment of the Cuban affiliate members who did not live in Havana to make sacrifices to attend the conference—especially those from rural areas who had to travel great distances. I spoke to professors who had taken long bus rides—10-12 hours to attend the conference. Those who did not have relatives or friends to stay with in Havana might travel all night to make their presentations and then return after one day to safe on hotel stays. More than one Cuban professor emphasized “perseverance” and “exchange and collaboration” with colleagues and professionals from other areas. Another spoke of the need to “do research on those topics out of our comfort zone in order to master them.” In personal conversations and formal presentations many made reference to getting to know the specific needs of their students. Another key to profession growth that was echoed throughout the conference was self-study, including observing your own ways to teach, reflections on our praxis. This is enhanced through collaboration, including peer observation, and collaboration in seeking feedback on the needs of students—not only academic needs but as human beings.

President Adita Chiappi addresses the closing session.

I left this conference determined to encourage other TESOLers to consider attending a future English conference in Cuba as well as to consider ways we as international colleagues can redouble our efforts to overcome Muslim bans, travel bans and to facilitate more professional collaborative projects with TESOL affiliates for international exchange around the world.

References

Merrica, D. (2017) Trump unveils new restrictions on travel, business with Cuba. CNN. http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/16/politics/trump-cuba-policy
/index.html June 17, 2017.

Irizar Valdes, T & Chiappy Jhones, A. (2012) Teaching English in difficult circumstances. Approach:A Journal of English Language Teaching in Cuba. 12, 28-33.

Perez Sarduy, P. & Stubbs, J. (1993) Afrocuba: An anthology of Cuban writing on race, politics and culture. Melbourne & New York: Ocean Press.

Zeitlin, M. (1967) Revolutionary politics and the Cuban working class. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Shelley Wong is a member of the Mason DREAMers advisory board at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia.