Wright State University is where Lilia Moyer is studying. She tells us why. “I’m going to Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio and I chose it because they had the TESOL program which is a program to teach English to students of other languages and I have always wanted to do that. While I lived in Brazil I was an English teacher myself and even while I was living there that was something I have always wanted to do.”
TESOL stands for Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages. Back in Brazil, where she is from, Lilia use to teach others, now she says her concern is being a college student herself. “It is a very demanding program I think. It is a lot of reading to do, a lot of writing. As I said I use to teach in Brazil and I was glad to come here and to see that a lot of what I was already doing in Brazil was actually being taught here so I felt like I was doing the right thing in Brazil,” she says.
“I use to teach for a language school over there and we used the communicative approach and I was really glad to see that some of the techniques and series that I studied here I already applied over there. I had a hard time in the beginning writing papers. I graduated in Brazil in Translation in 1992 and that was one of my major concerns, how am I going to adapt to a college life again,” she says.
“Being an adult I am forty years old and when I started this I was thirty-eight so I had been out of college life for a while, but you know you start doing it and then you see you are half way through and I am about to finish and it has been a very good experience.”
Although her studies are challenging, Lilia is determined to make it. Currently she is working on her practicum, which is part of her program. “I’ve been struggling a little bit with some classes about Literature, but other than that it is very nice. It is a very demanding program and as I said it is a lot of reading, a lot of hands on experience.
I’ve had to tutor some students as part of my program. I am taking my practicum right now and the LEAP program, (Learning English for Academic and Professional Purposes), which is the program that Wright State has to teach English to foreigners so it is a lot, but it is very gratifying. I enjoy it.”
Lilia says right from the beginning, attending Wright State University made her feel like she would definitely succeed there.. “As a matter of fact I went to another university first before I knew that Wright State had this program I told you about, the TESOL program and I was not very well received and one of the things I liked about Wright State was that they made me feel right away that I would be able to adapt and that I would be able to do it,” she says.
“The admission part and the English department, the professors they all were very supportive of me and they never made me feel like I couldn’t do it.”
In general Lilia says it is more of a younger crowd in her classes, however she says many of the students value her experience and knowledge. “It’s a pretty mixed group. There are or several kids as I call them, my classmates they are in their 20’s …twenty-two, twenty-four years old and some others are a little older than me, but in general it is more of a younger crowd, but I don’t feel like I don’t belong or anything like that, quite on the contrary,” she says. “They seem to appreciate my previous experience and they value that a lot.”
If all continues to go as plan, Lilia says she will graduate in November of this year. What she would love to do next is.....” I would love to teach at the program that I am taking my practicum right now, which is the LEAP program by Wright State University that is what I would like to do. I also would like to have the opportunity to go to Japan or maybe Korea to have some experience in a foreign environment, but mainly I would like to teach English at the LEAP program at Wright State University.
