Cebu: The world's English language hub?

For our special presentation on Straight from the Sky, we revisit the group that created the Cebu Hub for English Language Excellence (CHELE), which had an ambitious objective to make Cebu the International Hub to teach English to speakers of other languages. I had them on this show on Aug. 23, 2009 and it was time to revisit them and find out how far they have gone.

 Apparently CHELE has been very quietly active. They are having the 2nd Cebu International TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) Conference on Aug. 12-13 at the University of Southern Philippines (USP) Campus in Salinas Drive. I once attended a TESOL Conference three years ago at the Diplomat Hotel and they had 40 foreign speakers, two of them came from Oxford University in England.

 I’m particularly interested to know more about Accent Neutralization, something that was never taught in our English subject in college. This is what differentiates the English speakers throughout the rest of the world. As what Prof. Henry Higgins (George Harrison) said about the English language in the opening of the movie version of the Broadway play “My Fair Lady,” “There even are places where English completely disappeared. Well in America, they haven’t used it for years!”

 I was in Singapore with the Rotary Club of Cebu (Mother) a couple of months ago and we stayed at the Regional English Language Center (RELC), a hotel that was actually for students and teachers who wanted to learn English. This facility is owned by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), which means Singapore obviously desires to be an English language hub. But their problem is in their English accent.

 Cebuanos have a distinct advantage over our Tagalog brothers on accent neutralization. We say “apple” correctly, while the Tagalogs make it sound like “epol.” Cebuanos say “bicycle” also in the correct English accent while the Tagalogs say “baisikel.” It is for this reason why Cebu is fast emerging to be the English language hub of the world.

 Incidentally, the Meetings, Incentive Travel, Conventions and Exhibition (MICE) Convention will also kick off on Aug. 10-13th and the 2nd TESOL Conference will follow it. Little do the Tourism Industry insiders know or realize that big international conventions like the TESOL Conference is exactly what MICECON is looking to bring to Cebu. If CHELE achieves its objectives to make Cebu an English language hub of the world, it would mean thousands of foreign students coming to our shores and staying here not just for two or three days, but for three months! That should be enough to fill up our hotel rooms in Metro Cebu.

 The other thing that CHELE will do if and when they achieve their goals is something that the Department of Education (DepEd) has failed to do - improve our educational system. When Cebu becomes the English language hub of the world, that means foreign students and teachers would be coming here to learn English from us, something that was never in the radar screen of DepEd because they are forcing our students to learn a national language which they call Filipino, but is in reality Tagalog.

 So watch this very interesting show tonight as you maybe a witness to history unfolding or happening right now, the making of Cebu as the English language hub of the world. With us are the officers of CHELE, Chaired by Oscar Tuason from the Cebu Doctor’s University, Prof. Efren Valiente President, Mr. Tom Magee Executive Director and Mr. Paul Robertson CEO-TESOL Asia, who conceptualized this dream of making Cebu an English language hub of the world. So watch them on SkyCable’s channel 15 at 8:00 pm tonight and be inspired that we Cebuanos can make this dream come true!

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 Yes, the entire nation was taken by complete surprise when Pres. Benigno “PNoy” Aquino, III went to Tokyo for that momentous meeting with Murad Ibrahim of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) in the hope that that meeting would produce lasting peace in troubled Mindanao. Call it a public relations coup if you will, but I salute the President for having done that. Sure, it has not yet resulted in any peace agreements, but it certainly was a first step in achieving that noble goal.

 For 14 long years since the time of Pres. Ferdinand Marcos, the Moro separatists have taken up arms and fought for self-determination. But in the process, some 120,000 people have been killed in various encounters between the Moro rebels and the Philippine military. But I’m an optimistic person and I find nothing wrong with that meeting and we can only hope and pray that it would bring peace to our land. As we learned from the words of our Lord Jesus Christ when he gave us the “Beatitudes,” which you can read in Matt. 5:9, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.”

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