The Language Bloc

Ten IEL Preceptors Address Growing Demand
for English at Harvard

Last year, the Harvard Institute for English Language Programs (IEL) recorded nearly a 14 percent rise in course enrollments. This fall, with 63 sections, there was yet another 8 percent increase over the 1999 figures. Occupying every available classroom space on campus and offering classes from 9 am to 9:35 pm, IEL has decided to limit enrollments after this semester.

While most aspects of the IEL student profile have remained constant, two features of the growth in enrollments are worthy of note. First, although the Division of Continuing Education (DCE) has long granted IEL scholarships to Harvard staff who were not eligible for the University's Tuition Assistance Program, this year saw a sharp rise in participation by affiliates from the lowest-paid ranks of Harvard employees. The central administration joined this effort by fully subsidizing a pilot program for 38 Faculty Club personnel, offering them career advancement through improved English proficiency. The success of the graduates of this program led to the University's development of a comprehensive Bridge Program that will cater in coming years to the needs of hundreds of employees for enhanced workplace skills.

Second, individual students accepted by the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (GSAS) have occasionally come to Cambridge early to take intensive IEL programs and set up their apartments. This year a pilot program, completely funded by GSAS, was offered to students nominated by departments across the University. This four-week intensive program allowed 31 students from many disciplines and 11 countries to improve their English language skills and achieve greater familiarity with their professional and extracurricular environments before registering in their graduate programs. They had opportunities to meet and listen to lectures by a wide variety of Harvard professors, to visit museums and historical and cultural sites, and to take care of many logistical details before embarking on their graduate studies.

To prepare IEL to address burgeoning demand for instruction, DCE augmented the four IEL preceptors presented in last fall's Lamplighter --Cheryl Ernst, Kimberly McGrath, Jennifer Robinson-Sharapi, and Jilani Warsi--by six who began their appointments in September after a worldwide search:

Sharon Hannigan and Karl Reynolds

Sharon Hannigan received a BA in psychology with minors in biology and English from Assumption College, an MAT in teaching English to speakers of other languages from the School for International Training in Brattleboro, and a PhD in behavioral neuroscience from Boston University School of Medicine. Her international teaching experience includes the Peace Corps in Cameroon, Cambridge Rindge and Latin School, the Four Seasons Language School in Hamamatsu, Japan, and the Center for Orientation and English Language Programs and the psychology department at Boston University as well as many years as a part-time instructor in IEL.

Jeanne deMartinez holds an AB in Spanish from Muhlenberg College, an MA in Spanish and an MAT in applied linguistics from Indiana University, and is ABD in applied linguistics from Georgetown University. She had served as an instructional coordinator/student advisor in IEL since 1994, after several years of teaching English as a Foreign Language at the Meitoku English Center in Japan, in migrant camps, community outreach and refugee programs in the USA and Mexico, and in schools in Spain. Prior to that, she had worked for many years in teacher education and in certification and program evaluation in the Grand Rapids public schools.

Karl Reynolds has a BS in communication disorders from the University of Massachusetts and an MA and a PhD in linguistics from the University of Washington. He taught English and geography in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, linguistics at the National University of Lesotho on a Fulbright Fellowship, African languages and linguistics at Boston University, Kiswahili at Harvard, and English as a second language at Newbury College and Harvard's Center for International Relations before becoming a part-time instructor in IEL. He has also published on Niger-Congo languages and conducted an overseas language course in Tanzania for the US Department of Education.

Scott Simpson and Gladys Scott Vega

Gladys Scott Vega holds a BA in English as a foreign language education at the Instituto Nacional Superior del Profesorado en Lenguas Vivas in Buenos Aires, an MA in English linguistics as well as an MS in educational computing and a PhD in English from Purdue University. She recently held visiting appointments in Spanish and applied linguistics at Arizona State University and previously taught Spanish and English in Chicago, and in Denton and Hurst in Texas.

Scott Simpson has a BA in English literature cum laude from the University of Maine, an MA in English from Michigan State University, and an MATESL from the University of Illinois at Champaign. He taught for many years at the International College of Academics and Business in Japan and St. Mary's College in Nagoya, Japan, and served as core faculty advisor in the University of Illinois MBA Program while teaching in its Intensive English Language Institute.

Maria Zlateva received a BA in linguistics with a minor in French from Sofia University in Bulgaria and an MA in linguistics and translation theory and a PhD in theoretical linguistics from Sofia University. She is also pursuing a second PhD in applied linguistics at Boston University, and has specialized in translation in the Slavics Department at the University of Leeds, conducted linguistic research at the Universität des Saarlandes on a German Science Foundation Scholarship, and held visiting scholar appointments in many European countries and India before teaching French at Boston University and in the Extension School. In addition to teaching various courses, she served for three years as an instructional coordinator/student advisor in IEL before becoming a preceptor.

With the addition of these talented and experienced preceptors to the staff, the IEL Program was able to accommodate the growth in enrollments this fall. But limitations on office and classroom space necessitate the need to set limits on future enrollments. The Harvard IEL Program is recognized as one of the premier programs in the field, and we are determined to maintain that reputation.