Calling all ELT teachers!! And students too!
How do you find new students in Milan? How do they find you?
Recently, a good friend and colleague of mine excitedly told me about a new concept that does just this in Milan and its surrounding area called MILANOINGLESE. “A free meeting place for English Teachers in Milan and the rest of Lombardia and people who are looking for English lessons.” (Brian Avery, founder and owner of BeenDesigned)
On looking into it a bit more, I found that essentially, MilanoInglese provides a register of available Native English Speaker Teachers (NESTs/Mother-tongue) for students to find the teacher they need. If students can’t find a teacher in their area or when they are free, they can simply post a request. It’s as simple and as clever as that! I’m dead impressed, aren’t you?
Background.
The websites were set up by one of the founders, Brian Avery, who has worked in and around Milan for several years. He set up a business designing websites (BeenDesigned) and he and some friends of his, who are all teachers heading back to the UK this summer, have created the cutting-edge “milanoinglese” concept. They’re determined to leave their mark on the business capital of Italy, having experienced first-hand that matching students to suitable teachers and vice versa is still difficult even in this digitally connected day and age.
The look and feel of the websites is one of transparency and professionalism – things the ELT sector desperately needs to promote more of – so hats off to the team of creators behind the whole concept!
Services.
There are two distinct but linked websites which offer complementary services:
MILANOINGLESE.IT, written in Italian, is for Students. It’s the teacher directory for all the teacher profiles showing availability (days and times) and may include a photo (and video – planned for the future). Students can search for their ‘perfect’ teacher there. This site went live at the beginning of April this year.
MILANOINGLESE.COM, written in English, is where teachers register and provide details of their location and availability.
One extremely important recommendation that I particularly like is to be found on the teacher site strongly advising teachers to charge appropriate prices for lessons.
screenshot taken from http://www.milanoinglese.com/index.html
Registration.
Tightly monitored, registration is open to qualified and unqualified Native English Speakers alike, but they must be living and able to work legally in Lombardia and hold an Italian Codice Fiscale (the equivalent of a UK National Insurance number).
For people like me who’ve been working in ELT for years as well as those who are about to (for whatever reasons), I welcome these tight restrictions to guarantee quality and reliability for both teachers and students.
screenshot taken from http://www.milanoinglese.com/information.html
If you live in or near Milan, or you are moving to Milan or the surrounding area, I’d get registered if I were you. I see schools using this as a resource as well.
And finally, I wonder whether it’ll be open to equally needy areas other than Milan in future.
