History of ELI | About the Teachers

History of ELI

'We first got the idea to open an English language school from my mother, Hilda White, back in 1959. She was working in University College Dublin at the time where apparently they were being inundated by young foreign students who wanted to study English in the college. At the time there were no schools specializing in teaching English to foreign students in the country.

It seems that I have my mother to thank for a lot of things, for it was she who introduced me to Maureen Concannon with whom I later set up the Institute with in 1960, and who I was later to marry and have a family with. But, that is another story.

Maureen and I first started out not at 99 St. Stephen’s Green but down in the basement at number 100. Those were very humble beginnings. I seem to remember us using an anatomy table (which we had been generously donated to us by U.C.D.) as a desk which all the students would sit around.

Well, it wasn’t long till we had students coming over to us from Guatemala and other wonderfully exotic locations, and so we had to start finding them accommodation. Things were finally getting serious!

It was about this time that we came into contact with John Haycraft and his wife Brita, who were both doing highly innovative work over in London training teachers to teach non-native speakers the English language. John was very much concerned with the practical implications involved. In other words, how do you create the right environment for students coming from many different countries to interact with one another using a common language which is not their own? The question is just as relevant now as it was back then, and here at the English Language Institute it is a question which we continue to engage with on a daily basis.

But there was always another side to the Institute, as well. This was the cultural and social aspect, which we always felt went hand in hand with the language learning.

You see, we very much wanted our students to understand that although they were learning English they were doing so here in Ireland and we wanted to show them just a little of what the country had to offer, which of course meant organizing events.

Music always played a big part in these events. There was the night when we organized a concert for Dimitri Shostakovich in St. Patrick’s Cathedral. That was a highlight, for sure. Or when Michael O’ Rourke played all of Mozart’s piano concertos… These were easy, light-hearted events where students mingled together and had a real motivation to communicate with each other using English.

Meanwhile, back at the Institute we had talks by people like Seamus Heaney, Seamus Deane and Michael Mac Laimmor, among others. If I had one regret it is that I didn’t have some of these events recorded. But, such is hindsight.

Well, we are now well into our forty-sixth year. The Institute has survived to see the twenty first century, and we are looking forward to continuing our work for many years to come.

If you do decide to choose the Institute to learn English, we look forward, very much, to seeing you.