 So I am Alison Castle Kane. I work for Trinity College London as the head of business development for the UK and Ireland. I've been with them for a few years now. And yeah, pleased to be taking part in the ELT Ireland conference. Yeah, thanks for doing this. And can I start by asking you, what is Trinity's overall approach being in response to the pandemic? Sure, yeah. For those of you who don't know much about Trinity, so Trinity is a, we are a registered charity and of course we do English language exams, but we also do music, drama and the arts. So we have a whole, we've had a whole raft of things to think about with the pandemic and I'm sure a lot of companies and organizations will probably agree with me when we say that kind of moving into very rapidly into a digital space was really the requirement and we probably have achieved in 12 months what might have taken years to achieve. And so in some ways it has really sort of pushed us to look at our business and look at how we deliver our exams, not again, not just for English language, but also for the other subject areas. I mean, really at the forefront at the beginning of the pandemic, we were looking at digital grades primarily for music, so people who were learning the piano or whatever instrument, how could they continue to progress. So we introduced digital delivery and assessment of our music awards. And then we moved very quickly into video conferencing for the key exams for UK visa purposes. So for those of you who don't know, Trinity is one of the providers of the secure English language test for UK visa and immigration purposes. So that was obviously a really key part because it was an essential for people to stay in this country to remain as a spouse or whatever. So those two areas were sort of the first focus of moving into that digital space. And then that was quickly followed by how do we support language schools in the UK and Ireland. We typically take the Jesse exam, the graded examinations and spoken English, or the ISE exam integrated skills in English and how can we move that into a digital space so we move that delivery that video conferencing delivery. Made that available to schools around the UK. I think in the pandemic. When lockdown first started, you know, still very difficult for everyone we're all still struggling to make sense of it all but we realize that there was an enormous need for training and support and certainly in some of the sectors that we work in. The language school sector I think some schools who had already been in that online teaching space were quite comfortable when able to carry that part of their business forward, whereas I think other schools. That wasn't a place that they competed in so they found themselves really in need of training you know how do you teach effectively using online tools. There's a lot of free training that's still accessible. People can go back and watch some of those webinars, not just about preparing for Trinity exams but more broadly, you know, teaching listening online how you know what are some of the tools that I can use we covered all the skills we also covered multiple levels so really useful things no what you're teaching or whether you were preparing for an exam or not. The other area that I think was very interesting for us we had a huge great response to it. In the UK we support the ESOL sector so we run the skills for life exams within colleges and adult learning centers and one of their big challenges was, I've got students who don't have laptops and computers and you know I can't meet them face to face and they have to learn on a mobile device. So we did a lot of really practical sessions on how to deliver the same kind of lesson, but just using mobile and things that you could even what's up you know how can I work with these learners who are, you know, they don't have the same level of digital literacy so we did a lot of that and I think that was very welcome by a lot of people at a time when it was really needed you know everyone was looking for support and training and we really got in that space and then provided quite a lot I think. So that focus on professional development was really key. I think in terms of looking for resources from Trinity, I would certainly say to teachers out there, please go to our website and look at we run the transformative teachers webinars regularly. And these cover tech strands young learner strands English for specific purposes English for academic purposes and teacher education so they're run regularly. You can sign up to join those or run them, you know, watch them as recordings, and also all of those webinars that I just talked about you can access those. Again, if you can filter the webinars by topic area and just use as a sort of a bank of resources. The other area that we've really been trying to kind of refocus our energy is is to solve. And this is a interesting one because the market has really, you know, people are really struggling. Certainly they've been school closures. There's a lot of competition for jobs and I think teachers are finding themselves in this space of what do I do now you know upskilling, improving their prospects for the future so. So last year we launched the certificate for practicing teachers and this was a big one for Trinity because it's, it's a qualification that sits between certificate and diploma level so between that kind of initial level and advanced level, where I think teachers have been teaching for a few years maybe find themselves in a space where they're not sure what the next step is so. It's a really important development for Trinity and we're doing a lot of just a lot of focus on raising awareness around the certain PT. But importantly it's kind of accessible to everybody I mean you can do it online we have many providers that do it as a fully online qualification. If you change it will probably go back to maybe a blended model or even face to face model but it really depends on the provider, but the cert PT, it uses the teacher's context as a basis for the qualification so if you are working with very young people or you're teaching online or you're teaching corporate or you're doing Clil or we have some that's just come on for preparing nurses and doctors, you can really hone in on an area that is specific to you. So using your teaching context so it makes it a very relevant qualification for teachers, and really it's all about looking at materials in your environment so how do I critique, adapt, create materials that are going to be really useful in your teaching so I think that's a really interesting one for Trinity. Again in this environment where teachers want to do something that's a bit more specific to their own circumstances but also get that kind of next level qualification. I've been doing a few sessions on the cert PT in March, one on the third of March and 10th of March. And I'll give my details at the end if people want to just learn more about how it works and where you would go to do it or if you're also interested in kind of beefing up your TESOL offering that's an area where people I think schools are looking for additional revenue at a time where there aren't lots of students coming for short term or, you know, where they might even deliver a course completely remotely so this is an interesting development I think for TESOL providers. And yeah I mean I think this is a challenge for ELT Ireland to deliver the conference online but we've always supported the conference and it's so important I think even now even more so that teachers get an opportunity to share their teaching and their practice and their experiences, even if it's in a virtual environment. So Trinity are always happy to support ELT Ireland, and of course we will continue to do so in the coming years. I thought it might be useful just to share my details on screen if people want to contact me. So I again I look after Ireland and the UK and the Business Development Unit, but if you have questions about our exams or any sort of training that you might like, or just general assistance those are my details there so it's alison.castleatrinitycollege.co.uk. And of course any updates about when exams are running or how we're adapting delivery will always be on the Trinity website kind of upfront there. So, yeah, that's great. So it was a nice overview of what Trinity is up to, hopefully, and I hope you all have a very successful conference. Thank you very much, Alison you have covered all of all of the points there that I wanted to ask you about. And can I throw in one or two questions just at the end before we wrap it up. I think that one thing which is the digital divide, which I think has really been made very apparent, not just in the ESOL sector but also in even regular schools who have suddenly had to switch to, to online and the, the access to learning that suddenly is complicated because of that. That's something that kind of fits with Trinity's mission to try and work with us. Have you got different initiatives to try and overcome that because it's a big issue. Absolutely, you know, and it's, I mean I experience it as a parent as well having kids and knowing that, you know, it's not the same for everyone. And this is really tough. You know, as we said in the ESOL sector where people, they just don't have access to the same materials. And are they being, you know, that that's a barrier to their learning. Trinity did just launched the language access fund and we've had the fund available for music and the arts previously but we've now launched it for language. And this is all about trying to identify people that are experiencing barriers and what those reasons might be. And to try and support those learners who either need access to materials or to classes with the ultimate aim of taking some Trinity qualification. Now we've just done the first round of the access fund. And I think incredibly welcome at this time. But we've just had an amazing response from all people of all sorts of backgrounds, obviously asylum seekers and refugees and councils that work with those types of learners but also some really interesting projects where you know, people who've settled here and maybe volunteering in a food bank and so it's trying to kind of train them to help do their work better. So you kind of get a double whammy if you like. So there have been some really great projects. We haven't awarded everything yet for this first round. We're just making final decisions but we'll have another round that opens in April. Again, it's about tackling some of these issues where people don't have the same opportunities. So that next round will be open in April and if you just Google the Language Access Fund from Trinity you'll find some information about that. But again it's open to applicants from the An Ironman. Yeah, so that was a very interesting initiative so I think it was important to get it. I should have spoken about it. The last question before we finish is something that's with ELT Ireland as well. We found this that you have to kind of rediscover your mission and sometimes in a time of crisis it's kind of puts a very sharp focus on what really is important. Is that something you found in Trinity as well? Absolutely and I think, you know, you kind of hit the nail on the head there because Trinity, you know, our ethos is about communication and performance that runs through everything that we do. And the challenges for us is moving that into a virtual space and, you know, even with our language exams, so much about what makes Trinity exams unique is that we assess communicative competence so people's ability to construct dialogue and sustain dialogue and direct conversation and that's quite different in a digital space. So that's been one of our big challenges is how do we transfer that into the digital space, which we all have to do. You know, we're all communicating regularly over video, how many Zoom calls do you have a day now, you know, this is what we do. So I think this has been in a good challenge for Trinity in how do we keep true to those things that make Trinity Trinity but do it in a way that's responding to the pandemic and looking at how people need to learn and do their qualifications going forward. So a really pivotal point I think for a lot of businesses but definitely for Trinity.