September 7, 2004: Headlines: COS - Brazil: ESL: The Herald News: Katia Lund had spent a majority of her Peace Corps time in Brazil between 1968 and 1970. Upon returning to the United States, she became a teacher’s aide at an ESL classroom in Fall River

Peace Corps Online: Directory: Brazil: Peace Corps Brazil: The Peace Corps in Brazil: September 7, 2004: Headlines: COS - Brazil: ESL: The Herald News: Katia Lund had spent a majority of her Peace Corps time in Brazil between 1968 and 1970. Upon returning to the United States, she became a teacher’s aide at an ESL classroom in Fall River

By Admin1 (admin) (151.196.185.151) on Saturday, October 02, 2004 - 2:50 pm: Edit Post

Katia Lund had spent a majority of her Peace Corps time in Brazil between 1968 and 1970. Upon returning to the United States, she became a teacher’s aide at an ESL classroom in Fall River

Katia Lund had spent a majority of her Peace Corps time in Brazil between 1968 and 1970. Upon returning to the United States, she became a teacher’s aide at an ESL classroom in Fall River

Katia Lund had spent a majority of her Peace Corps time in Brazil between 1968 and 1970. Upon returning to the United States, she became a teacher’s aide at an ESL classroom in Fall River

ESL courses second to none at BCC
JAY PATEAKOS , Herald News Staff Reporter 09/07/2004
FALL RIVER -- During her Peace Corps days when she would spend six hours each day at the School for International Training in Brattleboro, Vt., Bristol Community College professor Katia Lund grew fond of the various cultures to which she was exposed.

"The Peace Corps helped me build an awareness for other languages and cultures," said Lund, who teaches English as a second language (ESL). "The audio/lingual training I received helped me to understand and appreciate what other cultures represent."

Advertisement
Click to learn more...
Lund had spent a majority of her Peace Corps time in Brazil between 1968 and 1970. Upon returning to the United States, she became a teacher’s aide at an ESL classroom in Fall River.

"I received a master’s degree in elementary education because in those days, there were few ESL offerings to take," said Lund.

Lund said BCC’s first ESL teacher was formerly a French teacher, signifying the parallels between ESL and other languages.

"To us, teaching ESL is teaching a modern language," said Lund. "These people are learning English in the same way we would learn French."

For Lund, being able to teach English to so many diverse groups from the area was "a way for me to travel through my students and learn other cultures."

"At BCC, there is such a huge range of students, ages and educational backgrounds," said Lund. "You could have a student in the GED program in Spanish or someone that had a medical degree in their own society. These people have such a wide range of world experiences, and they come with many different strengths and weaknesses."

Last spring, 68 new students were assessed for ESL, bringing the total number of students in the program to 118, representing 29 different countries and Puerto Rico. Seventy-four percent of the enrolled students were women, with nearly half of the enrollment coming from Brazil, Portugal and Puerto Rico.

"A lot of the students are Portuguese women who were laid off from their jobs in the factories. They know the American culture and the oral language but didn’t go to school," said Lund. "These women are so bright that if they had had the opportunity to go to school back then, they would have had much better jobs."

The ESL program, which featured only one three-credit course option when Lund started at BCC 27 years ago, now features eight three-credit courses, as well as four intermediate college courses and four advanced courses.

"I was at Truesdale (Clinic) the other day when I ran into an old student that had graduated from our program in June who had just received a scholarship to Mt. Holyoke College," said Lund. "These people have such a life-altering experience, bringing their family over from another country, and they are so excited about learning. They are highly motivated because they know that in order to get a good job, they need to learn English, and they work so hard at it."

During Lund’s last sabbatical, and in an attempt to replicate her Peace Corps experience, Lund and her husband, John, traveled to Costa Rica.

"I went to a language school to study Spanish," said Lund. "I wanted to put myself in the same situations that my students face each day. It was very challenging."

Jay Pateakos may be reached at jpateakos@heraldnews.com.


©The Herald News 2004





When this story was posted in October 2004, this was on the front page of PCOL:


Director Gaddi Vasquez:  The PCOL Interview Director Gaddi Vasquez: The PCOL Interview
PCOL sits down for an extended interview with Peace Corps Director Gaddi Vasquez. Read the entire interview from start to finish and we promise you will learn something about the Peace Corps you didn't know before.

Plus the debate continues over Safety and Security.
Schwarzenegger praises PC at Convention Schwarzenegger praises PC at Convention
Governor Schwarzenegger praised the Peace Corps at the Republican National Convention: "We're the America that sends out Peace Corps volunteers to teach village children." Schwarzenegger has previously acknowledged his debt to his father-in-law, Peace Corps Founding Director Sargent Shriver, for teaching him "the joy of public service" and Arnold is encouraging volunteerism by creating California Service Corps and tapping his wife, Maria Shriver, to lead it. Leave your comments and who can come up with the best Current Events Funny?
 Peace Corps: One of the Best Faces of America Peace Corps: One of the Best Faces of America
Teresa Heinz Kerry celebrates the Peace Corps Volunteer as one of the best faces America has ever projected in a speech to the Democratic Convention. The National Review disagreed and said that Heinz's celebration of the PCV was "truly offensive." What's your opinion and can you come up with a Political Funny?


Read the stories and leave your comments.






Some postings on Peace Corps Online are provided to the individual members of this group without permission of the copyright owner for the non-profit purposes of criticism, comment, education, scholarship, and research under the "Fair Use" provisions of U.S. Government copyright laws and they may not be distributed further without permission of the copyright owner. Peace Corps Online does not vouch for the accuracy of the content of the postings, which is the sole responsibility of the copyright holder.

Story Source: The Herald News

This story has been posted in the following forums: : Headlines; COS - Brazil; ESL

PCOL13856
89

.


Add a Message


This is a public posting area. Enter your username and password if you have an account. Otherwise, enter your full name as your username and leave the password blank. Your e-mail address is optional.
Username:  
Password:
E-mail: