The International Council of ESL Directors was held in Sydney from February 22-27, 2007 at the conference room of the South Pacific Division. Directors and operators of language schools from Bangkok, England, Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, the Philippines and the Czech Republic were present. The group was given a tour of certain part of the city of Sydney and also Avondale College with a special visit to Sunnyside, the historical home of Ellen White where the book Desire of Ages was written.
Dr Vernon Parmenter, the associate secretary of the GC, chaired the meeting with Elder Gary Rustad, associate secretary of the Southern Asia-Pacific Division. Gary functioned as the secretary of the Council. Issues on the innovation; recruiting, training and screening of volunteers; and developing and maintaining the spiritual mission of the language schools were the main topics being discussed. Reports on the progress of some of the schools were given:
The school in Prague, Czech Republic has almost doubled its enrollment
The SDALI in South Korea will be launching its 39th language school in Koomi City soon and it also reported a baptism of 186 students during the Winter Bible camp in February
The initiative to enhance the program of the language school in Pingtong, Taiwan
The development of one of the language schools in Taipei (Taipei Adventist Preparatory Academy [TAPA]) that has become a unique and successful international high school offering the Griggs International Academy curriculum. A 10-minute video, very professionally produced by the high school students there, was shown to the participants.
Some of the plans for the future meetings of the Council are:
Work on evaluative instruments and procedures to evaluate language schools
Develop policies on safety prevention in the schools especially in relation to issues of abuse
Maintain the standard of English language schools at the cutting edge while having a strong mission focus for its vision.
