Interview with Ingmar Albig, Centre Director of EC Malta “In order to learn a language properly, people must come to the country where the language is spoken”

INGMAR ALBIG, CENTRE DIRECTOR OF EC MALTA

Why should a student choose your school?

We proud ourselves for our academic excellency and serious approach to language teaching guiding our students every step of the way to achieve their best potential learning outcomes. We always listen to our students’ feedback and reinforce the positive and improve on the negative. Learning with other students in their right age group makes the students’ experience so much richer and more fruitful. Due to our good number of students from all over the world we offer all the levels in both, the younger adult school and the 30+ school, while maintaining a fantastic mix of nationalities.

In your opinion, which are the main benefits for a student to study abroad?

Obviously the language component but for the students it is an eye opener as they also learn intercultural skills, learning from different cultures, making new friends and becoming a true global citizen.

How do you see the future of language tourism?

Despite the digital learning format having gained quite a lot of traction in the past years and in particular in the past months, the unique value of face-to-face full immersion learning will always remain as this experience cannot be fully replicated online. In order to learn a language properly, and in a relatively short span of time, people must come to the country where the language is spoken. The thirst for travelling will also only get stronger once the pandemic is over.

What types of courses do you think will be most in demand in the future? 

General English courses will still remain to be the most popular ones in absolute numbers, however relative bigger increases may be seen for English for specific purpose, such as business and work related English courses.