Robert
Robert, with a BA (Hons) in Linguistics and TOEFL from Luton (now Bedfordshire) University, has more than ten years’ experience as an English language trainer. He has worked in the UK, in Spain and for the last seven years in Vienna, Austria. Robert is specialized in Business, Legal and Academic English and is the trainer to call for anyone wishing to take the Cambridge BEC and/or ILEC exams.
As well as language training, Robert set up and ran his own music company while in Spain, releasing 13 albums in six years and organizing tours and concerts around the country. Since being in Austria he has conceptualized an iPhone app and set up a small company to design and market it. As such he is very familiar with business start-up requirements and the legal aspects thereof.
Fluent in Spanish and increasingly able in German, Robert is now learning to speak Bulgarian. All this language learning experience combined with a focused education means that he has many suggestions on how to speed up language learning that go beyond conventional approaches.
David
David, a Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) from Keele University, UK and a Master of Music (MMus) in Composition from the University of Cape Town, was active as an orchestral conductor and as a professional percussionist in South Africa and Germany. He is a prize-winning composer whose works have been performed in Europe, America, Australia and South Africa.
In Germany, David tutored in the electronic music studio of the Stuttgart Musikhochschule, lectured in composition at the Hochschule für Künste in Bremen, and also lectured in percussion, composition, music theory and history of music at the Freie Musikschule in Stuttgart.
Between 1989 and 2005, David was the author of a number of music publications.
Since 1994 David has been a regular guest lecturer at the University of Cape Town, and, since 1995, a regular guest lecturer at the University of the Witwatersrand (Johannesburg). Having arrived in Vienna in 2011, David now works full-time as an English trainer and music professional. He speaks elegant British English with a very soft South African accent.
Sally
Sally has a BA Honours from the University of Kent in English Language and Drama and a certificate in Teaching English as a Foreign Language to Adults from the University of Wales. In 1996, she began teaching in CEE countries (Hungary and Estonia) where she worked for a number of years at the British Council, at a teacher training college and for an advertising research company.
Sally then spent several years in Germany, where in addition to providing English language training, mostly in banking, she began to work as a translator. Since 2007, she has been privileged to live in the beautiful city of Vienna.
Sally has attained a European Masters in Conference Interpreting and speaks German and Hungarian fluently. Since she learned her first foreign language relatively late, she has a first-hand understanding of the needs of professional people striving to learn, improve or perfect their English.
Roland
Roland is a qualified, experienced and native-speaker language trainer specialising in Business English, Critical Thinking and English for Academic Purposes.
His degrees are from Scottish and English universities (MA, Aberdeen; MA TESOL, Canterbury) in languages and language education; he also holds UK teaching and training qualifications and has a wealth of experience in tailoring materials to client needs to deliver unique, completely personalised language courses.
He also teaches on business degree programmes where he focusses on Critical Thinking for business. Based in Vienna, Roland has substantial cross-cultural experience and sensitivity through teaching and training in France, Canada, Italy, Libya, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman and Slovakia.
Erika
Erika, who holds a RELSA TEFL qualification, has been working full-time as a TEFL teacher for the past 15 years. She has also recently completed a Masters in TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) through Sheffield Hallam University.
Born in Ireland, to German speaking parents, her first language may have been German, but her native language is English as her education, life and work all took place through English not through German.
Having spent the last 18 years teaching English in the Czech Republic, China, Georgia, Turkey and Spain, Erika moved to Vienna in July 2018. Prior to teaching, she studied hotel management and worked in many different areas including hotels, office administration, customer services and computer manufacturing. She also successfully passed the first two years of the accountancy examinations.
With her varied background Erika possesses a good understanding of Business English and enjoys engaging with and challenging her students, and more often than not, learns from them along the way. Erika has also taught exam preparation courses for the Cambridge Examinations in addition to IELTS and TOEFL.
Her basic teaching philosophy is that learning should be fun and relevant, both the students and the teacher should enjoy the class. She achieves this by using authentic materials, role play and even games. It is always good to laugh in general, but it is really good to laugh in class, as we are more relaxed.
In her free time, Erika enjoys going for walks, gardening and cooking for friends. She is also a huge rugby fan and supports both the Irish international team as well as her local provincial team, Munster.
In 2017 Erika trained to be a Cambridge Speaking examiner for PET. FCE and CAE and, in 2018, underwent training for KET and the Young Learner Examinations, Starters, Movers and Flyers. She is also a certified IELTS speaking examiner.
Jon
Jon is from the south west of the UK and has been living and teaching Business English in Vienna for the past 10 years. He received his CELTA certificate from the International House in Prague and specializes in communicative language skills, one-to-one courses, and encouraging interaction from the shyest of participants due to his patient and friendly demeanour.
In 2008 and 2009 he acquired his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Film Studies from his hometown of Exeter, where he also gained a multitude of valuable cross-cultural experience studying alongside international students. He further explored this aspect whilst working at INTO University of Exeter, an organization for international students partnered with the university, where he arranged social activities, worked closely with academic and administrative staff and offered pastoral support and coaching for the studying students.
Jon is also an accomplished proof-reader, having worked on academic dissertations and theses, marketing campaigns for Magenta Telekom, diversity workshops and art exhibition handbooks.
Charles
Originally from Wichita, Kansas in the USA, Charles is an American living in Austria. After graduating with honors from the University of West Georgia in 2010, Charles received a Fulbright scholarship to go overseas and got his start teaching English at lower- and upper-secondary schools in Amstetten and Linz. After moving to Vienna in 2012, Charles worked extensively at an NGO as a project coordinator and teacher of English language weeks at lower-secondary schools across Austria.
Beginning in 2017, Charles became more interested in freelance English teaching. Currently, he is employed as an adjunct professor at the University of Applied Sciences Burgenland and teaches English in their “International Business Relations” bachelor’s program . Charles also works for the BFI as a part-time teacher and the British Council doing exams invigilation.
His professional and academic passions include language teacher training in active learning methodologies, linguistics and language acquisition as well as phenomenology. In his free time, he enjoys biking, writing, dancing, cooking and having a good time with friends.