AsiaTEFL: “Unity Within Diversity, Diversity Within Unity”
An Interview with Dr. Park Joo-Kyung
Those familiar with English language teaching (ELT) are most likely familiar with the international ELT associations TESOL Intl. Assn., centered in North America, and IATEFL, centered in Europe. These two associations have been with us for nearly a half century, leaving Asia underrepresented. To fill this gap, AsiaTEFL was relatively recently formed. The following interview is with AsiaTEFL President-Elect Park Joo-Kyung, a resident of Gwangju, and focuses on what AsiaTEFL is and what it has to offer the ELT community. — Ed.
KOTESOL: It is great to be able to talk with you, Dr. Park, about AsiaTEFL, an association that many KOTESOL members, and English language teachers in general, may not be familiar with. You are among the founding members of AsiaTEFL. Could you tell us how the association was founded and the rationale for establishing it?
Park Joo-Kyung: To begin with, AsiaTEFL stands for the “Asian Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign Language.” It was founded in 2003 by Dr. Lee Hyowoong of Korea Maritime University, a former president of the Korean Association of Teachers of English (KATE). As English was being taught in an EFL context in most of the countries in Asia, an international organization for the Asian region had been sought by ELT professionals in Asia. At the time, outside of national ELT associations in Asia, the only larger grouping was PAC, the Pan-Asia Consortium, a group of four national ELT groups. However, AsiaTEFL was expected to have the ability to cover the field of English education in the whole of Asia and reach beyond national boundaries for individuals and groups to work together toward commonly held goals of developing TEFL in Asia. With his strong leadership and passion for creating a new organization, Dr. Lee managed to gather 135 like-minded ELT leaders from many parts of Asia who served as the founding committee members of AsiaTEFL, and some of them – including you, David, and myself – have served on the AsiaTEFL executive council since its foundation. You can read about the background of foundation in more detail on the AsiaTEFL website at www.asiatefl.org.
As a founding and lifetime member, I have been privileged to serve AsiaTEFL in many important roles and functions including as the association’s first general secretary, as conference executive director, as well as director of both external affairs and financial affairs. I have also served as chair of the 2011 and 2020 international conferences, vice president of finance and public relations, and now as president-elect.
KOTESOL: Congratulations on being elected as president-elect. That means that you will be a president next year. I said “a president” because AsiaTEFL has a dual-president system with five vice-presidents. Would you explain how this rather unique system works?
Park Joo-Kyung: AsiaTEFL has two presidents, one of whom is to be from South Korea, and five vice-presidents, selected from among the top five countries or regions with the most members. This dual-president system was suggested by Dr. Lee Hyowoong when he retired from his decade-long presidency. In order to receive grants from Korea’s National Research Foundation (NRF), it is a must to have a Korean president and bank account in Korea. And to keep AsiaTEFL a truly international association, another president from outside of Korea was needed. For this reason,
The dual-president system was adopted, with each president in charge of different departments within the organization. Likewise, each vice president is in charge of managing a different aspect of the organization’s activities. This multiple-president and multiple-vice-president system works very efficiently and effectively in all the stages of planning and implementing the activities and events held by AsiaTEFL. After all, two heads are better than one.
KOTESOL: As you have worked closely with both AsiaTEFL and KOTESOL – including being a past president of KOTESOL – in comparing the two associations, what would you say are their major differences?
Park Joo-Kyung: I think, the first and foremost difference is in their membership body and their characteristics. KOTESOL, an affiliate of TESOL International Association and one of Korea’s various ELT associations, has unique, open, and foreign characteristics with its large number of expatriate members who are mostly from the countries where English is spoken as the first language. KOTESOL members and officers have different backgrounds in their education and career paths, which bring diversity and dynamics to the organization. In addition, KOTESOL is uniquely open in that any member can serve the organization in any position if they have the ability and willingness to share with others, regardless of gender, age, regional background, or many other factors that often function as stumbling blocks in Korea’s still traditional society.
AsiaTEFL, as an international association for Asian teachers of English, has the majority of its membership from Asian countries and regions, along with some from other parts of the world. Currently, the association consists of about 19,000 members (full and associate) from 97 countries. Associate members are those who register with AsiaTEFL without paying the membership fee but enjoy some limited benefits. As its motto “Unity Within Diversity, Diversity Within Unity” implies, AsiaTEFL has the Asian characteristics that are common among many members but presented in many different ways depending on the host and the venue of its major activities, such as its annual international conference and regular webinar series.
KOTESOL: You have just mentioned an international conference and webinar series. Will you tell us more about the major activities that AsiaTEFL is involved in?
Park Joo-Kyung: To begin with, AsiaTEFL hosts an annual international conference, rotating its venue to different countries in Asia each year – 10 different countries so far. The conference has traditionally been an in-person event, usually attracting more than a thousand participants, but due to the pandemic, the conference was held in hybrid mode in Seoul in 2020, and online-only in Mathura, India, in 2021. It will be held as a hybrid conference again in Malang, Indonesia, this year, and AsiaTEFL 2023 has recently been approved to be held in Daejeon, here in Korea. Hopefully, it will be an in-person conference, once again, as it commemorates the twentieth anniversary of AsiaTEFL.
Second, the AsiaTEFL Webinar Series was launched in September 2021 in order to provide the members with more opportunities for their professional network during the COVID-19 period. I was one of the presenters at the first webinar with the topic of “Connecting Asia through English Language Education: The Importance of Building Sustainable Professional Networks.” The webinars are held five times a year, in March, May, July, September, and November. Webinar 2 this year was held at the end of May, entitled “Augmenting the Pedagogical Landscape in ELT: Contextualizing the Trends,” and one of the three speakers was Dr. Lee Ju Seong, who is originally from Gwangju and also a KOTESOL member. Ironically, the Webinar Series has been a wonderful gift brought to us by the pandemic.
Third, AsiaTEFL has ReNs or “research networks” in which a group of researchers from three or more countries or regions conduct joint research and present it either collectively in a featured symposium or as individual featured speakers at a conference. Their research papers are also published as part of the AsiaTEFL Book Series, published by major international publishers such as Routledge, which brings us to the fourth activity of AsiaTEFL. The AsiaTEFL Book Series features in each volume research papers on the same topic written by authors from five to six different countries in Asia.
Last but not least, AsiaTEFL publishes The Journal of AsiaTEFL, a refereed publication devoted to research articles, reports, and book reviews concerned with the teaching and learning of English, especially in Asian contexts. It is now published online and is open-access. The journal is indexed in SCOPUS and has been accepted for coverage in the Emerging Sources Citation Index (ESCI). As the incoming president of AsiaTEFL, one of my missions is to provide any necessary support for the promotion and further improvement of the quality and circulation of The Journal of AsiaTEFL in order to achieve our goal of becoming an SSCI-indexed journal as soon as possible.
KOTESOL: Since you are now AsiaTEFL president-elect, next year you will be ascending to the presidency. What events and activities are on the AsiaTEFL calendar for, say, the rest of this year and next year?
Park Joo-Kyung: Well, there are three more webinars that will be coming up this summer and fall. The 20th AsiaTEFL International Conference is being held in Malang, Indonesia, on August 5–7. The conference theme is “Hindsight, Insight, Foresight in ELT in Multilingual Asia.” Next year, AsiaTEFL celebrates its 20th anniversary, and since the conference is hybrid, you will be able to take part from the convenience of your home. Special events and activities will be held throughout the year, including the 21st AsiaTEFL International Conference in Daejeon, on August 18–20. With the conference theme “Celebrating ELT in Asia: Visions and Aspirations,” it will be organized in a way that highlights AsiaTEFL’s twenty-year growth and development and projects its future as a world-class professional organization. More effort will be made to ensure the quality of the conference for both academic and cultural exchange, regardless of the conference mode: in-person, online, or hybrid. AsiaTEFL 2023 is to be held at the Daejeon Convention Center, a state-of-the art facility, and will provide all the participants with unforgettable experiences.
KOTESOL: For KOTESOL members – and for all EFL teachers in Korea, for that matter – what would you say are the benefits for them in becoming members of AsiaTEFL?
Park Joo-Kyung: AsiaTEFL is a unique venue for English teachers in this region and around the country to realize the goal of helping learners acquire communicative competence in English as a lingua franca and become global citizens. Its conferences are the largest venue in Asia for participants to engage in dialogue and exchange ideas with others from all sectors of English teaching and learning in countries and regions within and beyond Asia. You can also enjoy different Asian cultures full of varying tastes and flavors. One of the biggest benefits, though, is that you can enjoy all the major events and activities for a lower fee than for non-members or free of charge. If you are a graduate student, school teacher, or retiree, you receive a 50 percent discount on membership and conference registration fees. In addition, AsiaTEFL differentiates membership fees into three types according to per capita GDP of countries or regions, demonstrating that AsiaTEFL is a caring association.
KOTESOL: Well, we have covered a lot in this discussion. What else would you like to say to our ELT community about AsiaTEFL?
Park Joo-Kyung: If you have read my interview about KOTESOL, you know that I enjoy singing all kinds of songs, which includes the AsiaTEFL Anthem. It tells you so nicely and concisely what AsiaTEFL is all about:
“We teach a global language to open doors to new opportunities, knowledge, and the world. / With our grip on our traditions, we stand firm on our native ground. / We come from different lands, but we are one in a circle of dedicated professionals. / We are gathered here to forge strong links, broaden horizons, share our lives, / become the best teachers we can be, and open pathways through this universe. / In the air, we hear a vibrant harmony, the sound of people united for one goal: / Peace through friendship, knowledge, prosperity, in AsiaTEFL we will grow.”
I would like to invite all teachers of English to AsiaTEFL for them to realize their wishes of being satisfied, satisfying, and sustainable ELT professionals.
KOTESOL: “In AsiaTEFL we will grow” – what nice words to end this interview with. Thank you, Dr. Park.
Interviewed by David Shaffer.
Photographs and graphics courtesy of Dr. Park Joo-Kyung.
The Interviewer
David Shaffer has been involved in TEFL and teacher training in Gwangju for many years. As vice-president of the Gwangju-Jeonnam Chapter of KOTESOL, he invites you to participate in the chapter’s teacher development workshops (presently online) and in KOTESOL activities in general. He is a past president of KOTESOL and is currently an AsiaTEFL member and the editor-in-chief of the Gwangju News.
Gwangju-Jeonnam KOTESOL
Upcoming Events
Check the Chapter’s webpages and Facebook group periodically for updates on chapter events and other online and in-person KOTESOL activities.
For full event details:
- Website: http://koreatesol.org/gwangju
- Facebook: Gwangju-Jeonnam KOTESOL