Home Features Learning The Language Of Success A Learning the language of success FEATURES fter setting up a successful course helping people for whom English is a second language ‘project manage’ their way into the British way of life and, in one case, set up a business, an Ealing man is looking for someone to take the classes further. Neil Robinson from Ealing used his experience in teaching English, and in project management, to create a course to help 10 local people get on their feet and achieve their goals. All of the participants were learning English as a second language and nding it hard to know where to turn JANUARY 13, 2017 Cold weather update Deadline for primary school applications approaches Alice Gross memorial award launched for young musicians Residents urged to take care in cold snap Changes to council services over Christmas LATEST NEWS AROUND EALING ISSUE AROUND EALING FEATURES HISTORY BLOG NEWS GALLERY VIDEO ABOUT
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Home Features Learning The Language Of Success
A
Learning thelanguage of success
FEATURES
fter setting up a successful course helping peoplefor whom English is a second language ‘project
manage’ their way into the British way of life and, in onecase, set up a business, an Ealing man is looking forsomeone to take the classes further.
Neil Robinson from Ealing used his experience in teachingEnglish, and in project management, to create a course tohelp 10 local people get on their feet and achieve theirgoals. All of the participants were learning English as asecond language and �nding it hard to know where to turn
JANUARY 13, 2017
Ï
Ï
Ï
Ï
Ï
Cold weather update
Deadline for primary
school applications
approaches
Alice Gross memorial
award launched for young
musicians
Residents urged to take
care in cold snap
Changes to council
services over Christmas
LATEST NEWS
AROUND EALING
ISSUE
AROUND EALING FEATURES HISTORY BLOG NEWS GALLERY VIDEO
to develop their career or reach other aspirations.
With the help of the council’s Ealing Central Library, he ranthe class as a ‘pilot’ to test it out – and one of the studentshas gone on to set up her own business.
Buoyed by this success, Neil is now looking for support tokeep it going – or for a local group or organisation to takeit over from him. See the end of the article to �nd out howto get in touch with him.
How did it all start?
Neil’s professional background was in IT and projectmanagement. He had worked in 20 countries for variousblue chip companies, picking up “a real passion fordifferent cultures” along the way. But when his parents fellseriously ill in Australia, he decided a change of lifestylewas needed for a while and he eventually turned toteaching English as a second language.
“Having worked in so many countries myself,” said Neil, “Icould put myself in the shoes of many of the people whocan be very educated and very articulate in their ownlanguage but can feel stupid and isolated because theyfeel unable to communicate to the level they want to.”
He became certi�ed to teach, with a CELTA quali�cationaf�liated to Cambridge University, and then got someexperience of teaching through Action Acton for fourmonths. And did some more through the City of Londonambassadorial programme.
It led to a three-month drop-in English Conversation clubat Ealing Central Library which became so popular that hehad to turn people away. “I could only handle 15 people ata time,” Neil said. “There were 45 registered membersfrom 15 different nationalities coming in during that time– including highly-quali�ed and educated professionalsunable to �nd work or working in unpaid or very low-skilledroles because of their lack of language skills. I sawmassive potential there.”
This awareness, and a chance conversation at a projectmanagement conference, sparked the idea in Neil that hecould put together a course combining his two areas ofexpertise: Project management and language skills. “Ithought, I might be able to open some doors for theseguys,” Neil said.
Life is a Project
It led him to devise a course called Life is a Project, whichhe decided to run as a free pilot scheme to gauge the levelof interest and to see how successful it would prove forthe participants.
Neil said: “It provides a basic methodology for people –with the starting point of ‘this is what I want to achieve’and then mapping the stages towards getting there. Theidea is to lift them through the ‘U-curve’ of their experiencein the UK, when so many people get stuck in a rut after theinitial honeymoon period. It was about giving them thetools to lift themselves out of that rut and achieve theirgoals, using project management methods.
“I then had to try to �nd somewhere to run the pilot. Icouldn’t have done it without the help of Ealing CentralLibrary. They were very supportive and they knew me fromthe previous course I’d run. No one else would give me�oor space.”
The �ve-week course included a community project forthe group to organise and ‘project manage’ from start to�nish. For this, Neil was able to link-up with the BritishRefugee Council which helped the class as it organised alocal event to support refugees.
A year on…success
Now, a yearon, Neil hasbeen invited tospeak abouthis course as
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a case studyin cross-culturaltransition attheInternationalScienti�cConference onProjectManagement being held at a university in Riga, Latvia.
And, more importantly to Neil, one of his students hasused the skills she learned in his class to set up abusiness.
Laura Campanini is originally from Italy but is now living inEaling Common. With the support of this training she isnow running a weekly therapy and exercise class using thespecialised Biodanza ‘dance of life’ method, for which shewas previously trained and quali�ed as a teacher in Brazil.The sessions are being run just over the border in the ArtsEducational Schools building in Chiswick. When shestarted Neil’s class she did not know where to start or howto put her skills to use.
Laura said: “Life is a Project is a sensational course to helppeople open new paths in life. We can use it for anyreasonable project we are thinking , or dreaming, of doingbut are lost as to how to do it. Neil ran this course in a veryclear way, step by step with some practical exercises anda very helpful English. I’m grateful to have participated init. It was what I really needed to start my personal project.”
Neil said: “Here was someone who was bright and cleverbut struggling to speak English and getting frustrated butnow she is running her own business.”
“I think it is a complete validation of the concept of myclass and it does prove that if you invest in doingsomething for free there is a chance of it being of bene�tto everyone.”
Neil wants to continue the classes and has plenty offellow teachers and project managers willing to volunteer.But he needs some kind of grant or support to make ithappen. Alternatively, he is happy to hand over theconcept to a local organisation to run it. “I just want to seeit continued,” said Neil. “I’ve got a complete set ofmaterials which I am happy to hand over.”
