RBERNing Questions

Vision, Journey & Global Connection: A message from TESOL President Elect Okon Effiong

• Yasmeen Coaxum • Season 3 • Episode 18

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Episode Summary:

In this episode of RBERNing Questions, Dr. Okon Effiong, the incoming President of TESOL, sits down to talk to us at the TESOL Convention in Long Beach, California. Dr. Effiong shares his inspiring journey from aspiring genetic engineer to prominent educator in the field of English Language Learning. He recounts his first TESOL convention, his transition into leadership roles, and his efforts in founding the Africa English Language Teachers Association. Dr. Effiong also discusses the challenges and underrepresentation faced by African teachers, as well as his views on current political issues affecting language teaching. With a vision to advance TESOL's mission of promoting academic excellence and research, as the President Elect 2025, he emphasizes the importance of flexibility, advocacy, and global membership engagement in the rapidly changing landscape of education.

RBERNing Questions for this Episode:

1- As the incoming President of TESOL, what is your mission for the organization? What is your vision in terms of its development?

2- What was your personal reaction to the news about the executive order designating English as the official language of the U.S., and what did it motivate you to do as a leader in our field? 

3- Given the current anti-diversity and anti-multi-lingual climate here in the US, in which providing advocacy for our English Language Learners and our immigrant students is facing excruciating resistance, what advice do you have for the educators out there to keep them motivated?

Guest BIO:

Okon Effiong is an English lecturer at Qatar University. He holds a PhD in Applied Linguistics from the University of Southampton, United Kingdom. Okon is the Founder of the African English Language Teachers Association and the President-Elect of TESOL International Association. He is also the winner of the British Council ELTons Outstanding Achievement Award 2024. Okon held several leadership positions in TESOL International Association, and has given numerous international presentations. His publications include Cultivating positive reading attitudes with Grade 8 (Routledge,2024), Global Efforts in Advocacy for English Language Teaching and Learning: Conclusions and Futures (Michigan Publishing, 2024), When visible minorities lead visible majorities (Macmillan, 2023), and Continuing professional development in the Foundation Program at national university in the State of Qatar (Springer, 2023). He is the lead editor of Hybrid Learning in English Language Teaching: Motivation, Challenges and Opportunities (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2024), and co-editor of Decentering Advocacy in ELT: Perspective and local practices (Michigan Publishing, 2024), and The role of language teacher associations in professional development (Springer 2018).


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Okon:

And I'd asked myself, you don't sit outside and be criticizing. Don't be an armchair critic. If you want change something, you go inside and fix it. You don't fix it from outside.

Yasmeen:

Welcome to RBERNing Questions, a professional learning podcast where we answer your most compelling questions about teaching, serving, and supporting multilingual learners. I'm your host, Yasmeen Coaxum, and through our talks, I look forward to bringing the methods, philosophies, and stories behind teaching multilingual learners to light. Let's get into the show. Alright, so hello everybody and welcome back to another episode of the RBERNing Questions podcast, and today it is a privilege for us to have the incoming President of TESOL Okon Effiong here with us. So, I have so many questions for you, Effiong, Okon Effiong. I have so many questions. Um, but I wanna start with, we are actually now at the TESOL Convention here in Long Beach, California, and we've been attending some very interesting sessions. It's been really a nice experience so far. Now, Okon, the first thing that I usually start with is how I met my guests. So, with you there was a TESOL Around the World, something like this?

Okon:

Global Connect. Global Connect.

Yasmeen:

Yes.

Okon:

Yeah.

Yasmeen:

It was TESOL Connect Around the World. Yeah. And it was back in

Okon:

Yeah.

Yasmeen:

December and I heard you speak there and then I bothered you to be on this podcast. Thank you so much for joining me. Now, if you could just tell us a little bit about your current role in education to start.

Okon:

I teach in the foundation program at Qatar University and we are like a servicing department to the colleges there. So students pass through our program. Those who are studying in Arabic, they still have to do some embedded courses, and those who are studying in English, they still do some courses with us, we call Post Foundation, and I've been there for 13 years now.

Yasmeen:

13 years. Wow. Okay.

Okon:

13 years. Yeah.

Yasmeen:

Okay. And of course I'm going to ask you what inspired you to become an educator of ELLs in the first place, but I do know from listening to your story on another podcast called Ikigai Kaizen, okay, that teaching was not your first professional goal. I do know this. You mentioned wanting to be an accountant and then a genetic engineer, and so how did you ultimately become inspired to educate ELLs?

Okon:

I wouldn't use the word inspire. I fell in love with a lady and then I fell into the EAL education.

Yasmeen:

That's, that's a bit of a story. Okay.

Okon:

Yeah.

Yasmeen:

But what made you first realize that this was a profession that you wanted to spend a significant amount of time in?

Okon:

The lady I fell in love with is actually Japanese. We ended up marrying, and when I relocated to Japan, I realized I couldn't use my skills in science or whatever, and the only job I could do was to teach English. So I approached an agency and they sent me to a secondary school, and I didn't find that very challenging. So I had all the time in the world to do something and I asked myself, why don't you just grow in this profession then? Because I wasn't sure if I was gonna remain in the classroom as an English teacher, or go back to science. So I decided to take an MA degree from Anaheim University. It was online, and then went on to do a PhD in Applied Linguistics in the UK. So by then I knew I wanted to remain in this profession. I wanted to stay in the EAL world.

Yasmeen:

Now after that, right, so you wanted to be in the profession teaching, but what made you decide to then take on a leadership role?

Okon:

I was in a session yesterday, an Affiliate Network Professional Council session, and one of the leaders said that she was tricked into leadership. She was tricked into a leadership role, so

Yasmeen:

Is that your story? That's not your story, is it? Okay.

Okon:

No, that was her story, so mine is different because...

Yasmeen:

Good, okay.

Okon:

What happened was my first convention in TESOL in 2010 at Boston, there, Professors David Newnan, Kathy Bailey and Andrew Curtis, they gave a plenary on affiliates, global affiliates, and sitting there as a first time attendee, the US had 48 affiliates. Africa had only four. That was very disheartening and I thought, the whole continent with only four affiliates? With that disappointment and anger and being a first-time attendee, you know, you just, you feel so little when you're a first-time attendee. You don't know anybody. Nobody knows you. I sent an angry letter to the president, Brock Brady, asking him to explain why Africa had only four and America had 48. I wasn't expecting a reply. You know that president, president is so high up, he is not gonna even see my email, but strangely, he responded two weeks later, outlining the efforts TESOL had been making, and I'd asked myself, you don't sit outside and be criticizing. Don't be an armchair critic. If you want change something, you go inside and fix it. You don't fix it from outside. Then I sent an email to the executive director, then Rosa, and I told Rosa, I want to join a committee that will address equity, diversity, and inclusion. I was very welcome and I joined the diversity committee, so that was my journey as a member. One year on the committee, the past chair nominated me to be the incoming chair and I was like,"Hey, I don't know anything. I've only been with teams. I've only come to two conventions, so how do?" She said, it's okay. You're good, you'll do a good job. So I started taking on leadership roles there as the Chair of Diversity Committee. I went on to be the Chair Elect of E-F-L-I-S, and I went on to serve on the Nominating Committee. Then I served on the board, and now I'm joining the presidential line. Outside TESOL, I was also the president of Qatar TESOL, and then I founded Africa ELTA, which was Africa TESOL then. And so, this uh, this had been the journey and has been long and very rewarding looking back.

Yasmeen:

So there's a couple of things that I wanna highlight. First I know that you were a co-author for a chapter in a book. It was titled When Visible Minorities Lead Visible Majorities. Okay, so first, I love the title of this chapter, and this is from the book,"Language Teacher Leadership: Insights from Research and Practice." Now, you and the two co-authors of this book agreed that visible minority is defined as anyone who is visibly recognizably from a distance different to the majority of those around them in that particular context and or country. Right now, in this chapter, you talk about being a leader as a visible minority, and I'm going to just quote something that you said in the chapter where you're describing how you became a member of the Board of Directors of TESOL. You said,"I was nonetheless pleased to be the first black man on earth to sit on the Board of Directors of this prestigious organization that had been in existence for more than five decades. For me, joining this board was an opportunity to serve the profession and the various constituencies of the association. I did not see this as adding a feather to my cap or passively traversing the leadership pipeline, but I was instead answering a call of duty to serve in a leadership position in an association that is, at this point still comprised of and led mostly by women and/or Caucasians." So now that you are the incoming president, what is your mission for the organization and what is your vision in terms of the development of TESOL?

Okon:

I wouldn't say my vision or my mission because TESOL has its mission and its vision. So if I want to use the word vision, so my vision is to advance TESOL vision and we're principally a professional body, more focused on promoting English language teaching, promoting academic excellence and research, and being like the leader in the field that can advocate for our learners. So these are the things that I intend to push ahead and to make it better than what we have now given the opportunity.

Yasmeen:

Okay, and then the second thing I wanted to ask you, regarding what you said a few moments ago is, so you're the founder of the African English Language Teachers Association. Can you tell our listeners, I think you told us already a little bit maybe about what prompted the creation of this association. Perhaps it was lack of representation, but how do you think the members of African English Language Teachers Association have really benefited from it?

Okon:

I am very happy you asked that question because it was the underrepresentation that prompted me to found it, and we had a struggle from the onset. My friend Aymen Elsheikh was there with me from the very beginning when we launched our first conference in Sudan in 2016. He provided a platform for me to launch the association, and we've been working together ever since. I, sorry, I have to be careful with my language here now, because coming in as a TESOL President Elect is no longer like"we", I think the pronoun now has to be"they", because I belong to TESOL now.

Yasmeen:

Yeah. Okay.

Okon:

TESOL is my constituency. I belong to everybody now and to nobody. So I don't, so I don't have any affiliation with a particular language teacher association or Africa ELTA or Qatar TESOL, so since I'm now a TESOL person, so I speak for all the teachers in the world. So whether I may be mismatching the pronouns we and they, but I mean they. The teachers initially, there were struggles, which is typical of the African context, but between then and now, it's so rewarding to see how engaged the teachers are. The WhatsApp group is on fire. The cascading effects, the seminars and webinars going around, I mean, taking place in the entire country. The surprising thing is when we started then, you wouldn't find maybe more than 20 people in a Zoom webinar because of the challenges with the technological challenges bandwidth, the cost of getting data and all that, but surprisingly now, when Africa ELTA hosts a webinar, you find 80 to a hundred attendees, which is amazing.

Yasmeen:

Excellent.

Okon:

So they have found the need and the place to grow professionally and Africa ELTA provides that platform for them to continue to grow. Yeah.

Yasmeen:

Now, I also definitely wanted to, mention the climate that we're in now. So, for example, the climate that we're in here in America. Okay. with all of the political agendas that are happening now. So, the TESOL International Association made an official statement about the executive order that designated English as the official language in the U.S. So what was your personal reaction to this news and what did it motivate you to do as a leader in our field?

Okon:

I am happy you're using the word personal motivation or personal view. The view I'm expressing here is strictly my view. I'm not speaking on behalf of TESOL because I've not been inducted yet. After Friday, then maybe when I say something, someone can maybe assume I'm representing TESOL, but for now, I'm speaking as Okon, as a member of TESOL. This policy, TESOL has already issued a separation statement, but it is unfortunate because although countries like Qatar where I live Arabic is the official language, but then the documents shared has English. It comes in Arabic first, and then with the English translation. So I really don't know what this directive or whether it's a law, I don't know what you call it in America, what it is when they say English only, whether it's just going to be English and the official documents will not contain other languages. But my view as an English teacher is TESOL represents multilingual language learners, TESOL advocates for multilingual language learners. And that is what we stand for. We need to be able to use more than English to be able to advance the language learning process. So by saying English only is going to make it look like some parts of the world where they insist on English only because I've taught in some regions where they insist on English only in the classroom, and up till now they haven't made much progress with English language learning. We have the resources, we have the standards, we have the research potential, I'm referring to TESOL now, to promote multilingual language learning. And there's translanguaging. Research has shown that using more than one language actually helps in learning English. My position as an individual, as a TESOL, as an educator, is for us not to just stick to the use of English only in the teaching of English. So that's, my view for now.

Yasmeen:

Okay. Also along the lines of what's going on politically at this point. you also were, a co-editor of the book Decentering Advocacy in English Language Teaching: Perspectives and Local Practices. So you edited this along with Grazzia Maria Mendoza-Chirinos. I am familiar with her and also with, TESOL President, Deborah Suarez. Now, I know that in each chapter an ELT advocate, I'm just basically reading from the description,"An ELT advocate describes their advocacy project, and these stories offer insight into classroom and school focused efforts as well as social projects, and touch upon contexts in which educators may feel that they cannot engage in overt advocacy movements." So again, now more than ever, educators are increasingly facing situations, given the current anti-diversity and the anti-multilingual climate here in the US in which providing advocacy for our English language learners and our immigrant students is continuously really facing excruciating resistance at this time. So what kind of advice do you have for educators out there to really keep them motivated in their advocacy efforts?

Okon:

We are English teachers. We know how to use words, so if the word diversity is the problem, we can redefine the word. We can wordsmith, call it something else, and still stay within the law. TESOL advocates for all and exclusive use of a single language is considered exclusive. So TESOL will continue to promote diversity, equity, inclusion, and access because we are a body of teachers in the world, so we are not operating within the US framework only. We're a global association. So if a country makes a rule that affects part of our membership, we have to find a way to accommodate our members in a different way, which is why I said we can wordsmith it. We can call it something else and still be able to achieve the same aim that we set out to achieve originally because if we want to change the whole structure of the organization on the basis of what is obtained in one country, then it affects all our global members. So TESOL will need to look for a way to address this problem as it affects its members in the U.S. And I think maybe we just have to reword whatever diversity can be in a different language, but as long as we're still doing the same thing, reaching out to our people, advocating for them, then that's fine.

Yasmeen:

Alright. As the incoming President of TESOL, what are you most excited about in terms of what's coming? What are you most excited about?

Okon:

One thing is to contest an election, another thing is to win, and then, try to see if you can implement your manifesto. The TESOL board of directors functions as a body and speaks with one voice. I have my vision, I have my agenda, so it is for me to be able to sell my agenda to the board. If I can present a very strong case and the board buys into that vision, then I'll be able to implement it. So I wouldn't say I'm excited now because it's not like politics out there. You win, you have all the powers. The president doesn't have any power. He's just first among equals, he has one vote like any other board member. So I'm not gonna say when I become the president, I'm gonna do this, I'm going to do this. It doesn't work like that. So it is for me to present my case like any other board member that can present an initiative, discuss extensively, everybody will have an input, and if they see merit in my proposition, then they may adopt it. So that's the only way I can move forward. So, so I wouldn't talk about excitement, maybe excitement at the end of my time. If I've been able to achieve one or two things. When I look back and I say, oh, when I was the president, we could effect one or two changes. That's when I'll be excited. So I'm not excited now. When I become Past President, then I can be excited.

Yasmeen:

I mean, I'm gonna ask this and can we hear maybe one of the things that you are looking forward to possibly being excited about?

Okon:

I think I am, I'm more concerned about our membership, to see how we can engage our members and provide more services to the members. That is what really concerns me because at the end of the day, we're a body of members. We all need to be working towards ensuring that every member has that sense of belonging, which is why my electioneering campaign I was using, turning my TESOL to our TESOL so that everybody feels I belong to this organization, this organization belongs to me. So it's about engaging the membership and providing the resources they need, not just in one context, but across the globe. So whatever it is we can do, we seek ways of reaching out to Latin America, Eastern Europe, South Asia, Arab, the Arab World, Africa. So we've made sure our presence is felt in all parts of the world. That's when I know at least we've been able to reach out to the nooks and crannies of where TESOL members stay.

Yasmeen:

All right. So it's been really a pleasure to talk to you today and I am going to start to wrap up with two questions. So, the first question is, where can people find information about your work, anything that you have upcoming. You've co-authored and edited several works. Is there anything, are there any works, in the works? So

Okon:

Uh.

Yasmeen:

anything coming up or that our audiences should be aware of?

Okon:

Yasmeen, um, out here I'm an extrovert. When you see me, I'm extroverted. But on social media, I'm an introvert. I don't post things. I don't share what I do, and I'm also a product oriented person, not a process. I like my work to speak for myself, not the what I want to do or how. I'm going to do it.

Yasmeen:

Yes.

Okon:

If I've accomplished something, I want it to speak for me. And then, in the meantime, maybe Google Scholar has my publications, Google Scholar, Academia or Research Gate and then, and in LinkedIn or Facebook, I don't really, I don't make too much noise. Let, lemme put it that way. I don't make too much noise. So...

Yasmeen:

That's funny because that's where I found information about the TESOL event where I met you. It was on LinkedIn.

Okon:

It was on LinkedIn, yeah.

Yasmeen:

That's how I found out, but okay. Alright.

Okon:

That was part of the electioneering campaign. I had to put myself out there for people to see the name and just for name recognition. Yeah. Yeah.

Yasmeen:

Alright, so the final question that I ask all of the brave people who come onto this podcast is, what burning question should today's educators consider in order to improve their service to the English language learner and multilingual learning community?

Okon:

Our field is, I can liken our field to escalator, not the one you go up at the airport, that thing that belt people step on. Is it called escalator because I know the one that goes up. Escalator, yeah. Whatever you want to call it.

Yasmeen:

I call it like a conveyor belt, but that's not what it is. It's a belt. It's a moving walkway. Let's say that. The moving walkway.

Okon:

Yeah. Moving walkway. Thank you. American English. Okay. When I reflect, I just see our profession like a moving walkway that if you are not careful, you could really trip and fall down, or it might just jack you like a piece of luggage. So we need to be careful and also be aware of the rapidly changing landscape and stay abreast of things otherwise then we will just become irrelevant. So the only way to stay relevant is to stay in tune with all the changes that are going on in the world, not just in our field, maybe economically as it impacts us, and then technologically as it impacts us. So these are things we need to look at very carefully so we continue to examine them and then be able to position ourselves in a way that we'll continue to grow as a profession.

Yasmeen:

All right, so then the question I guess would be what is happening in the world now and what do I need to pay attention to? Yes. If we wanna put it in the form of a question.

Okon:

Okay. Technology, artificial intelligence. When we talk about artificial intelligence, we don't talk about artificial intelligence in the world because not everybody in the world hears about artificial intelligence, or even if they to hear about it, not everyone has the tool to utilize it. So these are very serious questions. How do we reach our members in the rural communities? Those English teachers who are teaching under the tree or who are just teaching with the chalk and eraser. No computers, no phones. How do we discuss artificial intelligence with them? They're still reliant on their natural intelligence to teach, to support learners. So that's one burning issue. Then the other one is the economic, because just like the COVID, when we had COVID, which impacted global economy, it also affected us. So policies, government policies can affect, um, the oppression of our association. So we need to be very ready. We need to be aware, and also very conscious of the things that could likely happen and have structures in place to mitigate the negative impacts of such policies or for policies or whether the trend, the global economic trend, how it might affect us and in the way that the association can support its members. In a way, an example is the recent policy now in the US that has affected the association's membership, strength and financial capability. So it's an opportunity to now seek other avenues, other revenue generating avenue to ensure our sustainability. So that's just the way I can put it now.

Yasmeen:

Okay, and unfortunately, there aren't often systems in place already, so people don't tend to have those systems ready until we really need them. I mean, you know, when we really need them, that's when we realize, oh, we should have had something in place.

Okon:

Being more proactive than reactive. Yes.

Yasmeen:

Right, the forward-thinking is what we need to do more of.

Okon:

Yeah.

Yasmeen:

Okay. So thank you Okon Effiong ladies and gentlemen, thank you so much for joining us today on the RBERNing Questions podcast.

Okon:

It was a pleasure. Thank you very much Yasmeen. Thank you for tuning in to RBERNing Questions, produced by Mid-State RBERN at OCM BOCES. If you would like to learn more about today's guest or any of the resources we discussed, please visit Mid-State RBERN's webpage at ocmboces.org. That's O-C-M BOCES.org. Join us next time where we hope to answer more of your burning questions.