ELT Best Practices: Intensive English Programs in the USA
by Sherry Blok, TESOL Blog

Alyssa Swanson, manager of Penn’s Intensive English Program, believes that best practices are routed in envisioning new avenues, bridging the gap between administrators and teachers, and engaging in professional development.

On July 12th, the Penn Wharton China Center kindly hosted Ms. Amy Nichol's talk entitled, “Changing Roles: Cross-Cultural Perceptions of Credibility and Confidence.” The audience represented a wide variety of individuals from retired executives to seniors in high school who shared many very interesting perspectives on credibility and confidence in the sports industry and in China. Many thanks to Jim Curtin, Head Coach of the Philadelphia Union, for allowing Ms. Nichols to include clips from his press conferences. 

Through our course, Writing the University Application Essay (UAE), we offer international students a meaningful step-by-step process to gain the knowledge and skills necessary to write an effective and memorable personal statement.

The Global Citizen Study Abroad Program (GCP) is a comprehensive Ivy League study abroad experience designed to foster the international compatibility and competitiveness of top university students. Students can choose to enroll in the full program (8 months) or accelerated program (4 months).

James Riedel, executive director of Penn’s English Language Programs, and Benjamin Wiggins, director of Digital Learning Initiatives at Penn, in collaboration with a number of Online Learning and English Language Programs staff members, received a $700,000 grant from the United States Department of State to develop and administer five open, online English language courses.

The first of the five courses, “English for Business and Entrepreneurship,” began May 15. Later in the summer, Penn English Language Programs and Online Learning will launch the “English for Journalism” class. 

Program: University Connection

Congratulations to this year's more than 100 UniConn students who have gained acceptances to schools such as:

Congratulations to Jeri Ahern, Elizabeth Gillstrom, Sarah Grosik, Amanda Kniepkamp, Karen Liebner, Eve Litt, Ian Nichols, and Alyssa Swanson who were accepted to present at the TESOL Conference 2016 in Baltimore, Maryland.

In February 2016, ELP Lecturer Maria Paredes Fernandez presented at the Northeast Conference on the Teaching in Foreign Languages (NECTFL) in NYC on Engaging Projects in Developing Cultural Competency using Project-Based Language Learning. She also presented on Project-Based Language Learning for a charette run by the National Institute for Learning Outcomes Assessment (NILOA) in New Orleans that same month.

ELP Lecturer Carlo Cinaglia presented at West Chester University's Sixth TESOL, Applied Linguistics and Foreign Languages Conference in April 2016. His study, "Supporting Novice Teachers through Mentoring and Peer Coaching" seeks to understand the experiences of TESOL M.S.Ed. students who participate in a semester-long team-teaching program, assessing whether their learning goals are achieved and recognizing best practices for peer coaching and mentoring support.

Learn more about ELP's use of technology in the classroom from Language Specialist Eve Litt.