It has been more than 3 months since I began my new career here in Turning Point Education (TPE) in Christchurch, NZ. Within this time, I feel I have grown as a person, a teacher, and what’s more, a trainer.
The experience that one gains when working in a new environment can be nothing short of exponential, if one has the drive to venture forth and explore. In this short amount of time, I have taught students of various nationalities and backgrounds, gained newer insights to teaching techniques, and most important of all I believe, made new friends.
Here every student is unique, and is treated as such. The student is treated as an individual, and is given individual treatment where the instructors are encouraged to take a genuine interest in their development and well-being. This, I believe, could only be made possible by the very nature of Turning Point Education being a boutique language school, where quality is given preference over quantity.
The Managing Director of TPE, Bronwyn Hardaker, is unlike many of the operators of schools and training institutes that are available in the market who seem to care mainly about facts and figures. She believes in implementing family values into the institution, where the students feel like they are a part of something bigger than just a short stint at another language school, just to get that job, or just to be able to live in NZ. They feel like they belong to a family.
This unique (though not new) view on education has provided me with a model to think about in planning future courses and programmes, both as a teacher and a teacher trainer.
I highly recommend Turning Point Education to anyone who wants to make a difference in their language education, especially if they are interested in working or staying in New Zealand.
