An Indelible Experience
I am Merliyani Putri Anggraini, an English lecturer at UIN Raden Intan Lampung, Indonesia. Through this writing, I would like to share my indelible experience attending the biggest international hybrid conference in English Language Teaching (ELT) areas held in Indonesia. Prior to joining the conference onsite, I enrolled myself to be one of the online presenters. The day after the registration, I saw a post from my colleague on a WhatsApp group showing a flyer about an open grant application for British Council Indonesia Sponsorship. The sponsorship was offered to 10 Indonesian English teachers/lecturers to attend AsiaTEFL-TEFLIN-INELTAL 2022, hosted by Universitas Negeri Malang. This program is an ongoing collaboration between the British Council Indonesia and TEFLIN (The Association for the Teaching of English in Indonesia).
I was so elated to apply for the sponsorship because this hybrid conference invited outstanding keynote speakers from ELT areas. I completed filling out the application form through the link in the flyer on the first day of registration, June 9th, 2022. The sponsorship covered the return flights, accommodation costs, conference fees, and daily substance allowance. The announcement of the sponsorship was in the middle of July 2022. I never expected to be selected as one of the 10 teachers and lecturers sponsored by the British Council since many of my colleagues also participated in the registration process. I did not know that I was accepted until some colleagues congratulated me on WhatsApp groups. I supposed that I was pranked by them because there was no official notification I received in my email. I initiated to ask the TEFLIN secretariat to confirm the announcement. They authorized the news and requested me to complete several forms, such as an agreement letter.
The hybrid conference was held for three days, starting from August 5th to August 7th, 2022. Before the conference, there was a pre-conference workshop on August 4th. I joined all the workshop topics regarding managing ELT classrooms using learning apps. All the featured speakers were astonishing in delivering valuable materials. During the workshop, I could not stop taking some important notes that I might apply to my classes. I learned many lessons from the speakers about the media for teaching English and the steps of implementing the media in the classrooms. For example, a session with the topic “Facilitating Collaboration and Interaction in Different Learning Environments” was presented by Mr. Gumawang Jati and Ms. Finita Dewi. They explained how to integrate some learning apps (i.e. Canva, AnswerGarden, and Tricider) in the teaching and learning process, including planning, implementation, and evaluation. I cannot wait to carry out the media into classroom practice.
The day after the pre-conference workshop was the first day of the conference. All participants were invited to attend the opening ceremony in the Graha Cakrawala building, a hall of Universitas Negeri Malang. I must admit that it was a mind-blowing opening ceremony. The guests were welcomed and presented with traditional welcome dances from East Java, Indonesia. The board of committees correspondingly expressed a welcoming speech. Both domestic and international participants were flabbergasted with the show. After completing the ceremony, we were allowed to take photos in the available photo booth before moving to the other building (i.e. GKB A20) to listen to a plenary speech given by Greg Kessler from Ohio University, USA. In addition, I met some outstanding acquaintances coming from various universities in Indonesia, and we took a photo of ourselves in the booth. After that, I did not miss the featured speech from Colm Downes, The Director of English, Education, and Society, British Council Indonesia. He discussed “Online Teaching, Training and Assessment – What’s Working and What Isn’t?”. The speech consisted of respective topics that were related to the upcoming day’s featured speeches.
The second day of the conference was also remarkable. It commenced with a plenary speech delivered by the president of TEFLIN, Prof. Utami Widiati, focusing on ELT and teacher professional development in the next new-normal condition after the Covid-19 pandemic. She deliberated her speech by associating it with the theme of the conference, “Hindsight, Insight, and Foresight in ELT in Multilingual Asia”. Besides that, many breathtaking parallel sessions were free to engage in. I tagged some rooms on the printed program book that I was interested in the topics. From the sessions, I gained new insights that inspired me to conduct research in the classrooms I teach at the university where I am affiliated. To close day two, the committee encouraged us to attend the cultural night with Korean night. As it was a cultural night, I dressed myself wearing Lampungnese traditional attire I had brought from Lampung. Our eyes were served with the Indonesian traditional folk songs and dances. In addition to that, traditional Indonesian foods, e.g. lontong kikil, martabak, and sate, were ready to taste. Likewise, Korean cuisines were available, such as kimbap. I went back to the hotel room with a happy tummy.
Sunday, August 7th, 2022, was the last day of the conference. I also presented my research paper in one of the parallel sessions on this day. I was in the same room with other presenters from Thailand and the Philippines. I predicted that we would be set in this room as our topic was around linguistics. It was an honor to encounter the chance as I could discourse on my research, receive constructive feedback, and exchange ideas with other scholars out of Indonesia. To summarize, this hybrid conference was a spectacular, inspiring, and well-organized conference I have ever attended. I would like to express my sincere gratitude to the British Council Indonesia for selecting me as one of the sponsorship awardees. Due to the chance, I can attend the conference onsite and meet excellent people from other countries and provinces in Indonesia. As a final point, the conference has developed myself to be more professional by enriching my knowledge, which I can bring value to the community. Thank you very much. Hopefully, I can keep joining other comparable ELT conferences in the future.
