Who are the ESL Staff?
The ESL Center is run by Veronica Campos who coordinates the tutors and many of the Center’s activities and services. The tutoring team is diverse and steadily growing. This fall semester we have eleven tutors working with us, and these will be the people most students will meet when booking a one-on-one tutoring session. With that in mind, we’d like to introduce you to the team and let you get to know a little bit about them all.
Meet the Center Staff:
Meet the Tutors:
- H.J. Cummins
- Mikey Estes
- Lori Klemm
- Adina Marcu
- Mike Magnotti
- Conner Morgan
- Karen Outridge
- Jihong Park
- Danny Sheehy
- Alicia Barrio
- Lady Bell
Veronica CamposHi! I’m Veronica Campos, and I’m the instructor for the NOVA Annandale ESL Center. I would like to invite all ESL students to come and visit the Center. We have lots of fun, exciting and educational activities for all of you. We hope to see you soon!
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Hello! My name is Sarina. I work in the ESL Center as a lab assistant. If you have any questions while you’re at the lab, do not hesitate to come and see me. I will help you as much as I can. You can receive tutoring from student tutors from NOVA that aid with conversation, grammar questions, and most anything else related to English that you are having trouble with. You can also use the computers that are installed with programs designed to assist students with English. We have a lot of helpful software like Tell Me More, which helps students with speaking and listening by having them talk to the computer program, and writing software that also assists with English grammar and writing. I am taking credit courses now, but previously I was taking intensive ESL courses also. I started in the low levels. I came here to receive tutoring and use specialized computer programs. As a result, I skipped many levels. Now I am taking credit courses and working here! I strongly recommend you come here and enjoy the benefits the ESL Center offers.
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Nguyet PhanHello, my name is Nguyet. I am from Vietnam. I know it is hard to pronounce my name, so take it easy because you can call me Moon instead. My name translated into English means moon. I have been living in the U.S. for a short time. My major is Business Administration and Management. I hope to get a degree in the U.S. I know how hard it is to study in this country and it takes a long time. I like to learn new things. It makes me feel challenged. I always try to do everything the best I can.
Let me tell you about a very interesting and wonderful place for everyone to come and share their knowledge. It is the ESL Center. Please come and make a tutoring appointment. We have an excellent tutoring team. Also, we have excellent software programs such as Tell Me More, FEG, UUEG, Writing Essay, Pronunciation etc. Lastly, the ESL workshop activities are very useful and a lot of fun. You will realize how these activities can improve your English skills. I am excited to see all of you here.
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I am a newcomer to the ESL Lab and the Washington, DC area. I am currently attending George Mason University as a graduate student, earning a certificate to teach ESL. I have professional work experience as a journalist and as a college English instructor. I studied German, so I can relate to the challenges of learning a foreign language.
I am enjoying my training to become an ESL teacher and I look forward to helping lab visitors.
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Hi! I'm Mike! but you can call me Mikey. I'm one of the tutors in the ESL center as well as a student here at NOVA. I'm an international studies major here at NVCC and my main focus is learning languages. I studied Japanese for 4 years in high school, Korean for 2 years in high school and one semester at NOVA, and Chinese for 2 semesters at NOVA. I have also picked up a few phrases from other languages such as, German, Russian, Vietnamese, Thai, and Arabic, so i know the kind of issues students can face when learning a new language. I have a love for learning languages, but i also have a love for teaching. I am a native speaker, born and raised right here in Northern Virginia, so if you have and questions feel free to ask me! I love helping students improve their English and become more acculturated to living here in America.
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Hello, my name is Lori Klemm. I am excited about being a volunteer at NOVA's ESL Center. I have found the ESL Center to be a very friendly place, and I hope that any of you who have not visited us will do so very soon.
I grew up in Japan, so I can empathize with students who face the challenges of living in a foreign country. It takes a brave person to move to a foreign land and learn a new language, and I feel privileged to help these students.
I have been studying linguistics at George Mason University in order to become an ESL teacher, and on the side I tutor many people in English. I have a special interest in helping people with their pronunciation. I hope to see many of you at the Center.
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Hey! How’s it going? My name is Mike. I’m a tutor at the ESL Center as well as a full-time student here at NOVA. It is my job to help you in any way that I can, so please don’t hesitate to ask. I was born in Connecticut, but have lived in Springfield, Va., for the majority of my life. Having spent a great deal of time in the same place, my English skills are strong. Another result of my never leaving this area is how much I enjoy learning about the world; so please feel free to tell me about where you’re from, as I am always interested to hear. I plan on leaving NOVA sometime in the next couple of years with degrees in Liberal Arts, Nursing, International Studies and Social Sciences. I look forward to meeting you!
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The ESL Center and teachers at NOVA have improved my chances to learn English. As an ESL student, I have confronted the same difficulties in studying a new language as any other ESL student. However, the ESL teachers at NOVA possess outstanding teaching methods that ease the challenge of studying a new language. Their focus on drilling ESL classes in understanding grammar, the organizational patterns of essays, writing and reading make them an indispensable resource for any ESL student. In addition, the ESL Center is the ESL students’ best companions. At the beginning, I was concerned that the instructors and tutors may not understand my English and I may not understand them. However, I quickly became familiar with them and the ESL software for reading, grammar and writing. Learning a new language requires hard work, so I have spent lots of time at the ESL Center trying to improve my English.
Since the spring semester of 2008, I have worked as a tutor for ESL students. I am a full-time student, but I make time to be there with the people who taught me English, and ESL students. It has been a great opportunity for me to contribute to others’ improvement in English. I like working in the areas of grammar and reading because they are both challenging and a cornerstone for better writing. I have enjoyed explaining grammar rules and sometimes student's questions challenge my knowledge, too! As a result, working at the ESL Center has turned out to be not only a fulfilling experience, but also an indication of confidence in the ESL Center!
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Conner grew up on a farm in the mountains where she raised horses, goats, cows and cats. She graduated from NOVA in December of 2008 and believes firmly in the power of community colleges and second chances. She has a husband and a dog, neither of whom listen to a word she says. Currently, she tutors both in the ESL Center and the Reading and Writing Center. She fills out crossword puzzles in pen even though she is not very good at them, and she feels that meeting people from other places and countries is almost as good as traveling there herself.
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Hi, my name is Karen. I’m a tutor here at the ESL Center. This is my fifth semester tutoring and I can’t wait to meet lots of new faces. I am currently an F1 student from England studying at NOVA. My major is Psychology and I enjoy the subject very much. I also like English -- reading and writing are hobbies of mine.
I love working with the ESL students here and I have a lot of admiration for them all. Coming to a new country is never easy and having to face the challenge of mastering another language is particularly daunting. The ESL Center has so much to offer its students and has really grown in even the short time I’ve been here. We’d love to help you, so come by and pay us a visit. You’ll always find someone around who can help you.
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I am Jihong. You can call me John. I am now in my second year at Northern Virginia Community College in Annandale. I came to the U.S. from Korea when I was 14. I went to Augusta Raa Middle School and Leon High School in Tallahassee, FL. I later moved to Northern Virginia, where I graduated from Mclean High School. I am fluent in written and spoken Korean, and I am competent in corresponding areas in the English language. The ESOL education I had received in middle school and high school prompted me to consider applying for a volunteer position at the ESL Center, for I am willing to return the favors to the educational system I have greatly benefited from. My strongest academic areas include basic and advanced math and spoken English, but I am prepared to assist in any areas when needed.
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Hello, I’m Danny and I’ve been working in the ESL Center for about two years. I’ve learned more from this job than I have in any English class, and I find it to be personally fulfilling, rewarding in a literary sense, and an enjoyable endeavor. I accepted the position at first with some skepticism due to a poor self-perception of my ability to help ESL students improve; mainly due to the reality that American students are poorly educated in the realm of English grammar. They know when something sounds wrong due to being reared a dominantly English-speaking environment, but rarely will you find an average American student harboring the ability to cogently articulate why a sentence is wrong, or even how to fix it in grammatical terms. Through this job I’ve learned how to do so, but I’m also aware that it would be naive of me to say that I’ve mastered my undertaken responsibility. It’s common place to see me spring from my seat and have a conversation enthused with a fast-paced debating tone with Veronica in order to resolve any confusion on my part, or even for questions that the both of us share.
ESL students have the unique ability to make two people utterly comfortable with a language question why some aspects of the language are structured in such a way, and then discover a way to communicate the accepted conclusion to the question in a coherent and understandable manner. The ESL Center always provides me with an arena in which I perpetually learn how to manage the facilitation of clarifying the English language, while also keeping me in an intensely personal atmosphere as I establish a rapport with the students I tutor.
I’ve learned more from working in the ESL Center than I have in all of my years of taking English classes as an American student. What brings me back to this job is the perseverance demonstrated by the students that come to the ESL Center; they are truly dedicated to learning the language, and it is students like those who make working at the ESL Center a pleasure. I look forward to tutoring some of you this upcoming Fall semester.
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Hello! My name is Alicia. I am from Spain, where I used to be a teacher of English as a Foreign Language. I fell in love with the English language after I spent several semesters in the UK, taking English courses. In the end, I became a teacher of English because languages and teaching became my passion. I enjoy figuring out what is the best way in which each student learns and how to build skills that will help the student learn independently. A few years ago, my husband and I moved to the United States with our two children. I decided then to take a graduate degree at George Mason University, to become a teacher of both English as a Second Language and Spanish as a Foreign Language. I really like being a tutor of ESL at the NVCC Language Center in our campus. It is a great place to learn for both tutors and students because of its deep commitment to student success. I look forward to assisting you in your classes.
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Howdy! (That's how we say "Hi" in Texas, which is where I'm from).
My name is Lady Bell. I have a Bachelor's degree in English Writing and I am currently studying to be a Nurse and Nurse Practitioner. I am passionate about science, travel, animals (especially dogs), and music. When I'm not studying or working as a tutor, I'm usually hiking, camping, playing guitar or ukelele, or watching documentaries.
I feel lucky to be working for NOVA's ESL Center! My day is full of talking to wonderful, kind and intelligent students (such as yourself) and I go home every day feeling like I've learned just as much as I've taught. When my work shift is over, I leave with a smile on my face.
One of my favorite things about tutoring is hearing about each person's cultures, opinions, ideas and life stories; it makes me feel as though I were traveling! Not only am I interested in helping students improve their English skills, but I aslo seek to build friendships with my students, get to know them, and make genuine connections.
I look forward to working with you!
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Hello everyone! I am Jungyeon Goo, a new Lab Assistant at the ESL Center. I came to the US one year ago and I've been working since the beginning of this Fall semester. Even though I may lack experience working here, I will do everything with my best effort to help you. Now I am a non-credit ESL student in the last level of classes. When I took ESL courses for the first time, I came here to practice speaking, practice grammar, and to have the opportunity to be tutored almost every day. As I result, I feel that I improved more and more. Many people ask me how they improve their English skills. I always suggest going to the ESL Center to use software programs or make an appointment with a tutor. It will help you in many ways. I hope you will take my suggestion, I would like to see you often here at the ESL Center!
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