Staff Spotlight: Mallory Lohmeier

In January 2010, the President of Georgia announced the current year as the year of education. Ongoing obstacles were addressed and extensive educational reforms were launched— Teach and Learn with Georgia (TLG) being one of the most ambitious reform programs to tackle educational development. Under the Ministry of Education and Science of Georgia (MES), TLG was designed to bring English speakers to volunteer teaching English in public schools throughout the country with the goal of improving English language skills of Georgian students and teachers alike, while fostering cultural exchange.

As a post-Soviet country, Georgia is at a turning point in its history. For centuries, while other countries and cultures were globalizing, Georgia’s borders were closed to the outside world. Now, as a sovereign state, Georgia has the opportunity to integrate with the rest of the world—linguistically and culturally. This is what makes TLG a particularly unique program. Bringing English speakers into classrooms increases English language proficiency throughout the country, which is essential to Georgia’s ability to assimilate into the modern world.

The first group of Volunteer English Teachers arrived to Georgia in July 2010. By January 2012, only two years after the program was announced, over 30 groups of Volunteer English Teachers, from over 35 countries, have been placed throughout the nine regions of Georgia and the program is transcending its original goals.

Today, 75% of Georgian students specifically picked English [to learn in school,] whereas previously, the dominate choice was Russian. Now, English is in the highest demand of any language throughout Georgia. Last year TLG had over 1,000 TLGVs and this year we are planning to hit 1,500.