Page 2 - ELG1702 Feb Issue 444

Page 2 ELglobal news February 2017

Getting a global perspective

IRAQ: The University of Mosul PERU: Eighty-eight English
was recaptured by Iraqi special The Gazette editorial team’s selection of ELT news from around the world language teachers are being
forces on 14 January as part of sent for a four-week training
their operation to liberate Iraq’s course in Arizona in the US. The
second city from the Islamic State teachers are beneficiaries of the
(IS), whose weapons factories Teacher Scholarship Programme
were found on the ruined campus. for English language teach-
The university, founded 1968, ing, granted by the National
was regarded as Iraq’s best, NETHERLANDS: A language AUSTRALIA: An international CAMEROON: A two-day ITALY: Lettori from the univer- Program of Scholarships and
especially for sciences and med- described as the ‘first cousin of student faces deportation on general strike – called in mid- sities of Bergamo, Catania and Educational Loans (Pronabec).
icine. It was captured by Islamic English’ is alive and well in a grounds that there is no evidence January in support of anglophone Verona – foreign lecturers, includ- The programme aims to improve
State during summer 2014’s northern province of the Neth- that her English is at the required lawyers and teachers in the ing English language lecturers, the methodological expertise of
exams week. Its president Obay erlands. Frisian (‘Frysk’), an level. Lulu Jemimah, a 30-year- English-speaking Northwest and denied the same salaries, work and teachers working in Peruvian
al-Dewachi has run Mosul Uni- official language used in the old journalism graduate from Southwest regions of the pre- pension rights of their Italian col- secondary schools. Applicants
versity in exile in Dohuk in the Dutch province of Friesland (Fri- Uganda –where English is an offi- dominantly francophone west leagues – were in the UK to present need to have at least a B1-level
Kurdistan autonomous region sia in English, Fryslân in Frisian), cial language – passed an English African nation of Cameroon – a petition to Minister for Europe of English and two consecutive
since it fell to IS. Al-Dewachi a region best known for the Frie- test 39 months before submitting turned the regional capitals of Sir Alan Duncan as we went to years of experience teaching in
told Al Fanar news agency he sian breed of dairy cow. Voice of her application for a post-study Bamenda and Buea into ‘ghost press at the end of January. public secondary schools.
was wounded in an assassination America radio station reports that visa. She also completed a degree towns’. It followed an escalating Early Day Motion 886 – a
attempt by IS over kick-backs the Frisian is enjoying a renais- in Australia, received a letter from three-month series of protests, Parliamentary motion submitted
they demanded for building sance, and it’s now cool for kids the vice chancellor of Macquarie strikes, mass arrests and several by an MP, mostly to draw atten-
contracts. He added that much to write in Frisian on social media. University endorsing her English fatal shootings by security forces tion to a cause – was expected
damage to the university was The Anglo-Saxons who set- skills, and is a theatre producer in these regions over the ‘mar- to be tabled on the same day in
from ‘aerial bombardment’, tled in England in the fourth and stand-up comedian. ginalisation’ of English-speakers support of the lettori on the sixth
which destroyed the university’s century spoke Old Frisian. In the As the Sydney Morning Herald in officially bilingual Cameroon anniversary of Italy passing a law IRELAND: There have reportedly
1960s printing press (used by IS seventh-century Law of Æthel- commented, she probably speaks (see the January 2017 Gazette). that ‘extinguished’ their claims for been ‘only ten inspections’ of lan-
to print its propaganda.) IS kept berht from Kent, the oldest English better than some native Violence erupted briefly on the compensation. Three court rulings guage schools to date by the Irish
only the medicine and health- surviving legal document in Old speakers. However, by law the first day of an otherwise largely in Italy’s Court of Cassation have Naturalisation and Immigration
care faculties open, while all but English, the word for ‘hair-pull- English language test must be peaceful ‘operation ghost town’, declared the treatment of the let- Service since a new Interim List
a few hundred students fled to ing’ (a punishment) is ‘faxfang’, passed within 36 months before when youths stormed French- tori unlawful, as have decisions of Eligible Programmes (ILEP) of
Dohuk. IS threatened remaining almost identical to the word in applying for the visa – and for medium schools that remained by the European Court of Justice. approved colleges that can spon-
teaching staff with death if they modern Frisian. this reason, the Australian press open during the strike in in the oil David Petrie, chair of lettori sor international students for visas
tried to leave. Scholars of the works of reports, the immigration depart- refinery town of Limbe. They were union the Association of For- for Ireland started in the summer
British Council Iraq’s acting English poet Geoffrey Chaucer ment states there is no evidence dispersed by police firing bullets eign Lecturers in Italy, told the of 2015. Meanwhile, Quality and
director David Pardoe reminded (1343–1400) would find the sig- of her English skills. and tear gas. The Committee to Gazette that a formal complaint Qualifications Ireland’s Interna-
the Gazette large areas of Mosul nage in the streets of modern-day Protect Journalists reported that against Italy by the European tional Education Mark (IEM) – a
remained under IS control as we Leeuwarden, Frisia’s capital, ‘government officials’ had ordered Commission over Italy’s refusal quality standard to be awarded to
went to press. ‘Although we do faintly familiar, especially with Bamenda-based anglophone radio to refer rulings on the lettori language schools – has been
not have immediate plans for so many nouns spelled with a ‘y’ station Radio Hot Cocoa 94 FM to to the ECJ, as required by EU delayed in Ireland’s legislature.
activity in Mosul we are expect- used as a vowel in the middle. shut down, sealing off their studios. treaty, is imminent. See opposite page for more.
ing to resume activity there once
the situation allows. I am sure BHUTAN: The Himalayan
that education and English will mountain kingdom plans to
form an important part of the put its ‘English teachers across Obituary: Zhou Youguang
future of Mosul after it is liber- the country’ through a five-day
ated,’ added Pardoe. training course to improve their Zhou Youguang, the Chi- ders Chinese characters’ nese in China, Malaysia,
OMAN: English-speaking volun- English skills, reports national nese linguist who created pronunciation into the Singapore and Taiwan.
teers organised by the Indian Social news website Kuensel. The the Pinyin Romanisation Roman alphabet. The task Some even fear Pinyin will
Club Muscat in Oman are teaching decision emerged from a Royal system, died in Beijing on was momentous. Zhou end up replacing Chinese
the language to migrant work- Education Council study show- 14 January. He had turned Youguang told the BBC characters altogether.
ers living at the nearby Al Ansar ing that Bhutanese students were 111 years old the day before. in 2012, ‘We spent three Zhou Youguang was
labour camp in Ghala Industrial graduating from high school He was born in 1906 and years developing Pinyin. sent to the countryside
UNITED STATES: A man has Area. Volunteers interviewed by without the ‘required’ English studied economics and People made fun of us, for ‘re-education’ during
been arrested and charged over the Oman Times include Gaurav level, along with a 2014 national linguistics, working also joking that it had taken us the Cultural Revolution,
the death of Hussain Saeed Selvaraj, one of many Muscat education assessment conclusion in New York and in Lon- a long time to deal with a fate common to many
Alnahdi, a Saudi student of residents of Indian origin, who is that teachers’ low English profi- don. In 1949 he returned just 26 letters.’ intellectuals. He became a
business administration at Wis- taking a break from a political sci- ciency had a negative impact on to China, and in 1955 was The new system did dra- strong critic of the Chinese
consin-Stout University in the ence degree at Bishop’s University students’ English proficiency. asked by the government matically improve literacy government, advocat-
Midwest. in Quebec, Canada. Training for English teachers will to lead a team for the crea- rates in China. Today it is ing justice for the victims
The Journal Sentinel reported He described the English be contingent on the education tion of Pinyin in a bid to widely used on computers of the 1989 Tiananmen
that during Halloween last year, taught at the migrant labour- ministry being able to mobilise increase literacy rates in and smartphones, and it is Square massacre. Most of
Alnahdi had been smoking in the ers’ camp as ‘really basic, like 9.5 million Ngultrum (£114,000). the country. the official Romanisation the books he wrote were
street in a nearby town while his spelling, sentence structure and The Pinyin system ren- system for Standard Chi- banned in China.
friends went in to order a pizza, grammar, to build up their con-
when an ‘unknown male’ started fidence a little bit’. Selvaraj
an argument. A friend told police recalled his initial difficulties
the man had punched Alnhadi in communicating with his students Obituary: Professor Jack Lonergan
the face, after which Alnhadi – ‘most of them only know a few
was seen bleeding from the words of “Hinglish” – Hindi with BANGLADESH: The High Jack was a Fellow of both versity and an advisor to Train de Parler for British
nose and mouth, with ‘difficulty a few words of English thrown Court has ruled that an earlier the Royal Society of the Xiamen University. train drivers on the Euro-
breathing’. He died of a brain in.’ So popular have the free imposition of Value Added Tax Arts and the Chartered Jack was born in Som- star London link to Paris.
injury the next day. classes become that ‘people are (VAT, sales tax) on fees and ser- Institute of Linguistics, erset in 1943, of Irish Jack initiated the White
Minneapolis resident Cullen bussed in from other camps if vices in English-medium private writes Peter McGee. Posts parents. He was educated Nights Teacher Train-
M. Osburn contacted Wisconsin they want to learn English.’ schools was illegal. A 4.5 per cent he held included presi- at Durham University (BA ing Summer Schools
police after they had interviewed VAT rate was added to fees in dent of the International DipED) and Manchester programme in St Peters-
his friends and family to admit private English-medium schools Certificate Conference, a University (MEd). burg, and welcomed
he’d been in a fight with Alnhadi and private universities in 2010, Council of Europe NGO, Colleagues and stu- many foreign diplomats to
and offered to ‘cooperate’ at an and then raised to 7.5 in 2014–15. director of the Ministry dents remember Jack as Westminster University’s
interview with his lawyer pre- Bengali-medium schools and of Defence Languages enormously encouraging, Diplomatic Academy of
sent, but he then went missing. government-approved English Examinations Board supportive and remark- London for diplomacy, lan-
He was tracked down in Min- COLOMBIA: The nation’s medium schools were exempt and joint chief inspector ably modest for someone guage and culture training.
neapolis in late January. As we second city, Medellin, has from the tax. This sparked pro- with the British Council so widely respected in his He played a crucial role in
went to press he was in custody inaugurated a programme in tests among parents, students Accreditation Scheme. He field. But he also had the almost all the developments
there, charged with felony mur- fifty state primary schools and and teachers at English-medium was professor of applied self-confidence to pursue in Westminster’s applied lin-
der and battery. eighteen state kindergartens private schools, and a writ peti- linguistics at the Uni- long-term language and guistics department.
Police sources said they had to teach English from an early tion was filed challenging the versity of Westminster, teaching projects until the We will miss his
no evidence that this case was age, including the use of native- legality of the VAT imposition. visiting professor at rest of the field could see humour, his kindness
a hate crime. The Star Tribune speaker teachers. The scheme Since no VAT was imposed on Guangdong University their value. and that warm smile with
reported that the Saudi consulate is seen as a possible pilot pro- other institutions, the High Court of Foreign Studies, a He was instrumental in which he used to greet
had sent a lawyer to ‘monitor the gramme for the whole country. ruled it illegal on the grounds of consultant to Hanoi Uni- French language course En everyone.
case’. See opposite page for more. discrimination.

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