Page 34 - ELG1909 Sep Issue 466

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RANKING 2019 UK Language Centres

In a league of its own Summer sums up St Edmund’s philosophy

Melanie Butler examines IALC It’s all about the whole child,

ver half of all IALC members one standard deviation above the sector Lee Hawkes tells Melanie Butler
in the UK rank in our top 100 average score of 4. For the non-statisticians St EDMUND’S COLLEGE
schools, and on average an IALC among you, that puts them in a different
Omember school scores 50 per cent league. FL teachers tend to be solitary. When I was teaching
more on its British Council Inspection than Pretty much the same league, in fact, as the Wimbledon School of English Juniors in London, I moved from school to school. We all did.
other accredited centres. UK university language sector, though still a I’d get friendly with someone when I was teaching in the
The International Association of Language little bit below the boarding schools. School of English Juniors went straight in EWest End, and six weeks later I’d run in to them teaching
Centres, to give it its full name, has member Now a word of explanation. This is based to our Centre of Excellence ranking on its in Hampstead.”
schools teaching ten languages in 23 countries. on the results for year-round adult schools. first inspection. It is now the highest-ranking I have grabbed a few minutes with Lee Hawkes, Director of the
It has its own multilingual inspection scheme We have had to exclude the junior summer summer school in Britain owned by a year- Summer school at St Edmund’s College, Ware. It’s the oldest Catholic
which, judging by the results, gives the British school operations because the sample size is round language school. boarding school in Britain, founded 450 years ago, and a permanent
Council a run for its money. still tiny, and one of the handful of summer The profile of IALC’s adult schools is a fixture at the top of the EL Gazette rankings. I want to find out why
And if we compare the year-round school operators in the UK is not accredited little unusual. There are two mode averages, boarding schools do so well.
schools like-for-like, we find that the by the British Council, so we cannot compare the scores that occur most often. Six members “When I got my first job as the EAL teacher at St Edmund's, it was
average year-round IALC school receives their inspection reports. have ten areas of strengths and six members a culture shock. This was an institution. A community. In a language Students in a summer ESL class at St Edmund's College, where the
a score of 8.4, which not only puts them in We will, though, make one exception to have two, and there are two standard school they just leave teachers to get on with it.” programme focuses on the whole child.
our Centre of Excellence Ranking, but is this rule. We must mention that Wimbledon deviations between them. I get the impression that the solitary Hawkes was uncomfortable
at first. Until he began to understand where the focus of this It takes time, it takes planning it takes military precision. “I spend
community was. three hundred days a year planning this. Hundreds of pieces of paper.
And then the first child arrives, and all that preparation gets put to
The focus of a boarding school is on the whole child. “You see
Strategic and quality management Student administration Academic management you send a message to the geography teacher to have a quiet word ethos has to be instilled into every member of staff. It’s not about
a child and you ask yourself: Has the child eaten? Does the child
the test…”
need a haircut? You see a child looking unhappy at breakfast and
From there, it is down to the community. The boarding school
you. It’s not just about the learning. It’s about the child. The child.
at break time.”
The whole child.
“The whole child. It is in the DNA of a boarding school,”
says Lee. “Private language schools… see students as epistemic
Gradually, as in every boarding school, the children become a
agents.”
community too. “They learn more outside the classroom, than in it.
I’ve always said that.”
My mental lexicon goes into meltdown. Lee, who mixed his time
Percentile Score Institution Type Staff management Publicity Premises and facilities Learning resources Academic staff profile Course design Learner management Teaching Care of students Accommodation Leisure opportunities Care of under 18s as an EFL privateer with stints running a university EAP programme “The traditional model of an EFL summer school has had its day.
But what they are learning, what they need to learn, is changing.
and writing a PhD on acculturation in international students, tries to
English in the morning, an activity in the afternoon, a quick trip to
explain. I think he means they see young learners as sort of learning
10.00 ELC Bristol PLS:A machines, where you shove language in at one end, and hope Cambridge on Saturday.”
something usable comes out the other.
The reason for this change is simple. “Their language level is
PERFECT SCORES 10.00 LSI Portsmouth PLS:A had a second child and almost immediately, took over as Academic much higher. Not only in Southern Europe, everywhere. Especially
Hawkes ’s doctorate was put on hold when, in the same year, he
China. Whatever they’re doing over there, it’s working! The
10.00 Wimbledon School of English PLS:A Manager of the summer school. “I had been academic director for Chinese 11-year-olds we get have a higher level of English than
TOP 9.47 English in Chester PLS:A some years. But nothing prepares you for this job.” the 17-year-olds.”
2% Boarding schools will adapt. When you
8.95 Cambridge Academy of English PLS:A have been around for 450 years you have
seen a lot of change.
TOP 5% 8.95 English Language Centre, Eastbourne Ï PLS:A St Edmund’s introduced English through
8.89 London School of English PLS:A ST EDMUND’S COLLEGE other subjects, what we might call CLIL, a
decade ago. Now they are working on the
TOP 8% 8.42 BEET Language Centre PLS:A new ‘big thing’, based on the OECD vision
of the future of education, what people call
8.42
English Language Centre, Brighton
PLS:A
21 Century skills.
st
“For parents, it’s about giving your child
BS
TOP 12% 7.89 St. Clare's, Oxford PLS:A the edge, the advantage. It always has been.”
London School of English, Canterbury
7.78
But if it is no longer about the language,
7.37 Accent International Language Consultancy PLS:A what then is the future of the language
summer school and the lone language
7.37 Excel English Language School PLS:A
teacher?
FE
Lee has left the solitary life, turned away,
TOP 18% 7.37 Hilderstone College, Broadstairs PLS:A too, from the lonely life of the academic. He
Studio Cambridge NEW
7.37
7.37 Torquay International School PLS:A has become the leader of a summer school,
a community, an institution.
7.37 Wimbledon School of English Jnr Summer NEW PLS:Y “I know it sounds cheesy, but the reward
of this job is…not when a child thanks me,
6.32 CES Edinburgh PLS:A they very rarely do that! It’s when they see
TOP 30% 6.32 CES Harrogate PLS:A me out of the corner of their eye, and give
a little smile.”
PLS:Y
6.32
Globe English Centre
Focus on the child. The child. The whole
6.32 Melton College PLS:A An aerial view of St Edmund’s College, in Ware. child.
34 September 2019 editorial@elgazette.com 35