After the Global Pandemic, BCNE’s ESL Certification Training Leveraged Online Learning and Streamlined Its Schedule and Structure
Recent graduates of the BCNE’s streamlined English-as-a-Second-Language certification training class smiled with their certificate in hand.
Over the past four years, there have been many changes with the English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) certification training, a staple of the Baptist Churches of New England for decades. The curriculum has been streamlined and three of the four training sessions are now held online.
We found that the length of the training had become cumbersome and extremely overwhelming for students. With the onset of the global pandemic, we were encouraged to find new ways to deliver the in-person training. With this invitation our team went to work.
Pam Seremet, a member of Nashua Baptist Church, Nashua, NH, and Maddy Miller, a member of Victory Church, Tiverton, RI, have been ESL trainers for New England Baptists for more than six years. They both bring a passion for reaching the nations and for teaching effective techniques that help others learn English and share their faith at every opportunity.
Click here to learn more and register for the Spring 2025 ESL Certification Training. (Deadline: March 25, 2025)
Pam works with the International Institute of New England, where she teaches ESL students, develops curriculum, and mentors teachers. Maddy is retired from Manchester (NH) Public Schools and she volunteers for medical missions in the Dominican Republic.
As we prayed about how we should move forward with ESL, we decided to leverage online learning and set to work designing the structure so we could drop the content into a logical format and timeline.
We settled on three online sessions that focused on enhancing the learning and assignments they were doing on the platform designed especially for ESL. The fourth session, which was held at the BCNE Multiplication Center, Northborough, MA, an in-person class, brought the content together so that participants could experience what it would be like to lead a class and see how activities would help their students practice their English. This final session, which doubled as a certificate ceremony, let students practice their testimonies with each other so that they could make sure that it resonated with people whose native language is not English.
Over the past five years, our team has found added interest in the ESL certification program, so we have transitioned from an annual training event to offering three events per year—in the winter, the spring, and the fall. Classes range from five to twelve students.
All students begin with an orientation that gives them a thorough understanding of the commitment they are making to complete the certification. Students must attend all the online sessions, complete all the assignments on the learning platform, and attend the in-person session. All requirements must be met before a certificate can be given.
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CHAIR OF LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT MINISTRY
Pastors and their leaders need inspiring and informative training on an array of topics including but not limited to children’s ministry and VBS, trauma counseling, addiction recovery, ESL teaching, and digital evangelism. The BCNE’s Leadership Development Ministry offers encouragement and assistance as needed.
Laura Berg teaches an ESL class at The Church on Seven Hills in Worcester, MA
The requirements come from our agreement with the National Literacy Missions Partnership, a Colorado-based organization of Southern Baptist state conventions that cooperate to support literacy ministries. They designed our curriculum, trained our team, and gave us permission to use their material.
Over the past five years, our BCNE team has trained 131 students and we have issued certificates to 119 students. Many of those students are part of an ongoing ESL ministry and are now able to help teach students. Others complete the certification process so they can start an ESL ministry at their church.
Laura Berg, who was part of an earlier ESL certification class and is a member of The Church on Seven Hills, Worcester, MA, was one of the students who took the class because her church was planning to start ESL as an outreach. After certification, Laura became the director and, along with two others who took the same training, launched their ministry.
Laura found the class very helpful in guiding her to know the basics for setting up an ESL ministry, but she quickly learned that it needed to be customized to their setting and to the volunteers they would lead. Their ministry has been going for two years now and Laura continues to encourage her new volunteers to take the certification training in hopes that they can see the ministry expand. ESL certification proved to be an invaluable tool to helping her church reach the nations!