Embassy Work: RELO

Another aspect of my Fulbright is working with the Public Affairs Section (PAS) of the US Embassy and the RELO (Regional English Language Office(r)), assisting them in their efforts to support English programs and teachers in the area. So here are a few things I’ve gotten to participate in connected to the RELO:

Access: Conference in Saly (I wrote a blog about Saly already, so you can read about it here) and Graduation: The Access graduation was a nice little ceremony to honor those students who had completed the two-year Access micro-scholarship program (to learn more about this program, you can read my blog on Saly, or see the description on the State Department’s website). Safi, the RELO assistant, was the Master of Ceremonies, and the acting Chief of Missions (the person who stands in for the Ambassador when they’re absent or we don’t have one, which is the case right now) was there to speak.

Each group of students does some sort of performance and there are a few speeches given. A student representative spoke, as well as a representative of the parents. Pictures were taken of each school’s group with their certificates and Martina Boustani (the acting Chief of Missions). It was a nice little ceremony and I’m sure some of the students who graduated are future English teachers!

ATES Annual Conference: ATES is the Association of Teachers of English in Senegal (yes, it’s an awkward word order because it uses the French word order, but English words). Once a year they have a big conference for Senegalese English teachers. This year it was held in Bambey, which is a small town a few hours east of Dakar. In recent years the Fulbright ETAs have done presentations for the teachers, either at the actual conference on Saturday, or at the workshop that is offered by the RELO on Friday. For the RELO workshop Safi gave a presentation about project-based learning and then I gave a presentation on teaching academic writing.

I am certainly not an expert in academic writing, but it was a subject they had specifically requested, so I did some research and my best. The workshop was very well attended… maybe too well! We had originally expected 80 participants because usually the workshop is specifically for the English teachers of the local chapter that had the task of organizing the convention that year, but people from other areas came as well, so there were almost 200 people. The room wasn’t really meant for that many people, so we were pretty crammed in there. Unfortunately it was already quite hot out, so that didn’t help increase the comfort level, but we all made it work. The next day was the actual convention, and since I presented at the workshop, I didn’t present during the breakout sessions. None of the other ETAs presented, but the two ELFs, Lea and Liam, gave presentations, as did a few of my students, supervised by Mathiam Thiam. One thing the conference showed me was how motivated, dedicated, and interested the English teachers here are; they really seem to have a thirst for knowledge and ways to improve their teaching.

Mathiam and Myself with two of our students who presented in Bambey

ELF Conference

The English Language Fellows had a regional (sub-Saharan Africa) conference here in Dakar and Eran asked ATES if they wanted to have a workshop day with them. Of course they were very interested, and they decided to hold it at FASTEF where I teach. Not being an ELF, I was not presenting, but I was “hosting” since I am part of the English department at FASTEF. I arrived first (of course) and was able to give the ELFs a tour of the campus while things were getting set up.

Three breakout sessions were planned, with teachers being able to choose the subject that interested them the most. I ran around a bit at the beginning making sure everyone had what they needed (projectors, whiteboard markers, etc.) and was a “moderator” for one of the rooms. Because there were breakout sessions, the moderators are in charge of taking notes and recapping, briefly, the presentations to the whole conference at the end.

English Language Day (ELD)

English Language Day is a day to honor English teachers in Senegal, especially the one chosen as teacher of the year. There are presentations on teaching and information booths in order to inform English teachers of the resources available to them. ELD was held at the local university, which made it very convenient! I knew many of my students would be there and the RELO had a table. Anthony, the other Fulbright ETA in Dakar, was slotted to do a presentation and I was ‘moderating’ his presentation (meaning I introduced him and did the Q&A session afterwards). In typical Senegalese fashion, it started a couple of hours late, but I didn’t mind because it gave me a chance to catch up with Safi, the assistant RELO, who I hadn’t seen in a while.

I ended up helping her man the RELO booth for the day, which was nice. They honored the teacher of the year, as well as Ngouye Mbaye, the sweetest woman who has just retired from running the English office of the Senegalese Ministry of Education. It was a very nice tribute to her and generally a nice day among English enthusiasts.