Federación Argentina de Asociaciones de Profesores de Inglés (FAAPI) is a group of twenty-two teacher associations in Argentina.
FAAPI’s conference is the most important ELT academic event in the country and is organised by a different sister association every year.
In September 2016 the conference was held in the city of San Juan (located in San Juan Province), organised by the teacher association in this province.
The theme of the 2016 conference was “ELT as a Multidisciplinary Endeavour: Growing through collaboration”. Among other central themes was the 400th anniversary of William Shakespeare’s death, with presentations that honoured his work and its potential for the L2 class. Another central theme was the Argentine Independence Bicentennial, which invited the reflection on the importance of the mother tongue in the teaching and learning of foreign languages.
These topics were addressed in the different presentations: plenaries, semi-plenaries, workshops, special sessions, different strands, panels, a play with children’s voices, and a theatre play by the professional company The Performers.
The plenaries and semi-plenaries were delivered by top-notch speakers from Argentina, Latin America and around the world:
- Argentina: Dr Darío Banegas, Dr Mario López Barrios, Jennifer Verschoor, Dr Claudia Ferradas, Susan Hillyard and Susana Liruso.
- The UK: Dr Silvana Richardson, Sue Kay, Dave Allan, and Dr Luke Prodromou.
- Spain: Dr Laura Alba Juez and Dr Luis Villacaña.
- Brazil: Lucy Crichton
- Uruguay: Gerardo Valazza
- Mexico: Jair Felix
- Palestine: Aziz Abu Sarah
Their presence contributed to the high academic level of the conference, which the attendees valued as very positive. It is also worth mentioning that numerous teachers and researchers from our country and neighbouring countries participated in the concurrent sessions along the three days of the conference, offering 50 papers and 25 workshops.
An Academic Committee with a federal composition selected some of the papers presented for publication. The chosen papers were compiled and edited by Dr Darío Luis Banegas, Dr Mario López-Barrios, Dr Melina Porto and María Alejandra Soto. This publication is available free of charge on FAAPI’s website.
The event took place in different venues in the city of San Juan, offered free of charge by the Provincial Government and the National University of San Juan. This conference was attended by a great number of colleagues, which stands as proof of the success achieved by all the previous annual FAAPI conferences. Concurrently with the academic activities, an exhibition of specialized material for the teaching of English as a foreign language for different age groups and linguistic levels was held in an adjacent hall. This exhibition allowed the main publishing companies, distributors, wholesalers, retailers and similar companies connected with the teaching and learning of English in our country to show and share their products with the eager participants.
Moreover, one of the sponsoring companies offered an open theatre play to the participants of the conference and community from San Juan in general. The free-of-charge initiative was enthusiastically welcomed by the public.
In addition to the National Ministry of Education and Sports, the event was endorsed by the following state-run and private institutions and organizations:
- Provincial Ministry of Education (San Juan)
- National University of San Juan
- Philosophy, Humanities and Arts School (UNSJ)
- Catholic University of Cuyo (Argentina)
- Ministry of Tourism and Culture of San Juan
- Provincial Legislature (San Juan)
- British Council
Due to its immediate reach, this event in the city of San Juan had a highly positive impact on the educational aspects of ELT. It also promoted tourism and the economy of the province,. During the Conference as well as before and after it, around 700 participants contributed to the economic development of the Province (hotels, restaurants, tours to different sights in the province, purchase of world-famous wines and fine olive oils, etc.)
However, FAAPI is more than its annual conference, since it offers monthly webinars by well-known colleagues, on-line courses on Academic Writing, and the Daniel Fernandez Scholarship in honour of our colleague, who died an untimely death but left his imprint on Argentine ELT. Also, twice a year FAAPI publishes the Argentinian Journal of Applied Linguistics (AJAL). For the current issue, please visit the AJAL website.
FAAPI’s Executive Committee is grateful for having been granted the Hornby Scholarship in 2016. That grant allowed the Federation to launch an online platform and carry out one of its most valuable projects, an online seminar called “Writing to be heard in FAAPI Conferences”, led by renowned experts in the field Raquel Lothringer and Dr María Susana Ibáñez. The course is being repeated at the moment, with even more participants than last year, both from Argentina and from foreign countries.
With the above mentioned grant, FAAPI also hired a web conference environment to carry out webinars. In 2016 Mariel Amez and Alicia Artusi shared two very interesting webinars, both related to the use of ICT in TEFL. FAAPI’s Executive Committee is planning to continue offering these successful webinars in 2017.
To sum up, in a number of ways FAAPI fosters teachers’ continuous professional development and thus fulfils three of its founding objectives:
- A) To encourage the professional growth of English teachers and to strive for constant improvement and updating of ELT curriculums, programmes and methods.
- B) To strengthen links among English teachers and Argentine and foreign educational and cultural institutions which aim at the dissemination of the English language and the enhancement of its teaching.
- C) To foster friendship and solidarity among the Associations it brings together.
Contact details
Should you wish to reach the FAAPI Executive Committee, please contact us at:
- Email: FAAPI President, FAAPI Vice-President, FAAPI secretary, general information
- Our website
- Our Facebook page
- Argentinian Journal of Applied Linguistics
You might also be interested in joining us at our 2017 conference in Posadas.
