At the British Council, you are not learning English on your own. All our courses are taught by highly qualified, experienced teachers.
Olga has been teaching English for the past 11 years in Ukraine and Malaysia, and this is her first adventure living and working abroad. She loves Malaysia for its diversity, food and friendly people. Olga graduated with a degree in Linguistics and Foreign Literature, and also has certificates in teaching adults and young learners.
Jan has been teaching since 2005 and in Malaysia at our KL branch for more than two years. With a BA (Hons) in Economics, a Trinity Cert TESOL and a DELTA, Jan adds humour to make teaching and learning a pleasure. When not in the classroom, Jan is a water baby and prefers being underwater in the ocean as she is also a trained PADI Dive Master.
Julian loves helping students with pronunciation, studying real-life news stories, using educational technology and encouraging students to be more autonomous. His favourite kind of lessons are the ones where all students are involved in lively debates or discussions. After studying English Language and Linguistics at university, he has spent eight years teaching in the UK, Spain and now Malaysia.
Meet Holly Matthias, a Young Learner Coordinator and teacher at the British Council Kuala Lumpur. Before moving to Malaysia, Holly taught in Spain, Italy, Finland and the UK, so this is her first time living and working outside Europe. Her favourite thing about Malaysia is of course, the food. She graduated from Cardiff University with a degree in English Literature and has always tried to get as much literature into her lessons as possible. She also has Trinity DipTESOL in teaching English.
Leonard has been teaching in our centres for over three years but he has over 17 years of teaching experience in total. Leonard graduated from the University of Hertfordshire in the UK with a bachelor's degree in Business Administration with a specialisation in Marketing. Leonard has also completed a number of qualifications in English teaching as well as qualifications in teaching Mandarin. Leonard loves meeting new people from around the world and hearing their stories.
Deeya has been teaching young learners and adults for six years. Teaching young learners is her preference, and she plans to specialise in that. She has a CELTA and a Masters in Education (TESL) and is currently working towards the diploma in English language teaching (DELTA). Her interests are in whole child development and incorporating elements of this into all her lessons. She also enjoys encouraging her learners to think creatively, both in and out of class.
An academic at heart, Andy possesses multiple qualifications; Bachelor of Arts in Film and Broadcast Production, Masters in Education, Post Graduate Certificate in Education and CELTA. Joining the Penang centre in May 2016, Andy was previously the Head of Schools for the first bilingual school in Hanoi, Vietnam before moving to Sabah to work on a teacher mentoring programme led by the Malaysian Ministry of Education and British Council.
Shideh first started teaching adults in 2005 while she was living in Iran. She has a Master's degree in physics but she is passionate about teaching English, so she refocused her career from physics to English by taking the CELTA programme and later completed her DELTA at the British Council. She was one of the first teachers who started working in our Damansara branch when it opened in 2014 and Malaysia is like her second home now. She loves her life in Malaysia and the shopping here!
Nathan has been teaching for six years in China and Malaysia. He graduated with a degree in International Relations from the University of Aberystwyth, he holds a CELTA and is currently working through the Diploma in English language teaching (DELTA). Nathan particularly enjoys teaching older primary and teenage students and his interests are in developing their skills in error correction, proof reading and drafting.
Mudhar has been living in Malaysia since 2011 and loves everything local especially the people. He is also multi-linguist as he speaks English and Arabic and is learning Japanese. Mudhar writes a teaching-related blog and plays electric guitar for two local bands (instrumental and rock!) as well as building and painting figures in his free time.
