Guest piece- If I Was a TEFL Billionaire…
By Burcu Akyol, whose blog is home to the fabulous recent Spread Your Knowledge series. Of all those guest writers, seems I was the only one clever or cruel enough to ask for a return guest piece from Burcu, and glad I did:
“The only way I can be a TEFL billionaire might be giving a chance to those Twitter marketers who claim that earning thousands of dollars everyday is just one click away:-) You think I don’t have any chance? Well… Alex told me that his blog is a place where imagination has no limits and I decided to be a TEFL billionaire for a single post:-)
What would I do if I was a TEFL billionaire?
I would ….
… do my best to provide equal education opportunities for children of my country and sponsor volunteer educators who want to do the same in their countries.
… make big and smart investments to increase the quality of teacher education such as providing high quality technology-integration courses for free.
… donate a huge amount of money to IATEFL to provide scholarships for a considerable number of teachers to attend the annual conferences either as speaker or participant.
… organize my dream ELT conference. I’m not giving details now, ’cause I’ll do it in the future although I’m not a TEFL billionaire! (At least I’m passionate about it:-)
… find passionate, idealistic, and dedicated teachers from different countries where there is a shortage of materials and training, travel to those countries and provide them with all they need.
… support wannabe ELT writers and speakers financially.
… make a huge investment in interactive softwares for young learners of English and provide the software for free for all countries. By the way my software will come with computer labs and wi/fi, technical support guys who are great motivators as well and continuous teacher training! Wow! Am I flying or what???
And now some socialising and a few favours for friends:-)
… send private jets to my favourite ELT people and educators from Twitter and the blogosphere, and invite them to Istanbul for a dream holiday. It would be great to meet face-to-face!
… buy Gavin three fantastic islands in real life:-)
… buy an exotic island for Shelly and Aniya in second life:-)
It feels great to become a TEFL billionaire! Thanks Alex!”
You are very welcome, the pleasure is really all mine! The first guest piece on If I Was a TEFL Billionaire is here, and would love to see other people’s thoughts either here or on other blogs.
Tags: guest writers
August 10th, 2009 at 9:34 am
And me, and me… what about my island Burcu?
Oh, right, I am from an island – I left it for Germany. I guess I don’t need to be a TEFL billionaire.
I love your ideas though, so many of them are things I have dreamt of doing too – you and me girl, we need to meet up in real life we’ve got so much in common ;-)
Oh, and you too Alex!
K
August 10th, 2009 at 10:37 am
Great piece Burku. Some lovely ideas and I agree that with money great things could be achieved but it’s not easy. I think we are already achieving great things albeit in a small way!
I must check out second life! I really like this online EFL world we’re in but it would be great to meet in Harrogate (my home territory!)!
August 10th, 2009 at 6:06 pm
Burcu,
With all these wonderful desires, I hope you become a TEFL billionaire! I, especially, like providing “equal education opportunities for children and volunteer teachers!” I would even take this over my island but that would be quite nice as well!
August 11th, 2009 at 3:55 pm
Dear Burcu,
Beautiful ideas. And what is fantastic about them is that they are not that irrational.
There are thousands of people who could do this in a jiffy, they just don’t because they just don’t care. I live in a country where some of the richest people in the word think about how to make more money by building higher buildings and creating a snow paradise in the desert (ah, yes, and bid for the Olympic games) instead of building better schools, investing into adult education … the list is endless.
I think your ideas reveal why you aren’t (and probably never will be) a billionarie. I don’t think this is how they think. This is why they’re billionaire and you’re not.
Sorry, this was meant to be a light-hearted comment on your fantastic entry, got carried away by my idialism again.
Thanks, really enjoyed reading it.
Tamas
August 13th, 2009 at 3:32 am
I love your ideas, and will keep my fingers crossed that the universe (or Twitter marketers) send billions your way so that you can do all these things, and hope some of the new island owners are gracious enough to invite the island-less (like me!) over to play.
It also made me think about what we can all do in our own little corners of the world to accomplish some of your goals–because they are very, very good ideas.
Thanks!
August 13th, 2009 at 3:38 am
Burcu,
Thanks for thinking of me. I’m prepared to wait for my islands until all the other good work is done, but I guess with that amount of money I won’t have to wait too long… I’ll start designing now…
Gavin
August 15th, 2009 at 5:07 pm
…..”how to make more money by building higher buildings and creating a snow paradise in the desert (ah, yes, and bid for the Olympic games) instead of building better schools, investing into adult education … the list is endless.”
…..When a prince takes power he should do his worst right away, because after that his every deed will strike his subjects as in improvemnet on the way he started out”.
Mesmerising…..
Bayezid