What do a poker game in English, a Mexican Independence Day celebration, and a Spanish lesson with jamón have in common? All this is part of the learning process at the LA PAZ language center. Its founder, Yanina Pikulenko, proved that learning foreign languages can be not only effective, but also really exciting. About how a network of two branches and more than 50 teachers grew from one rented office, why students drink champagne in class, and how language opens not only borders, but also cultures – in an interview with the “Expert Opinion” program on Krania FM with host Denys Kar.
Denis Kar: Friends, congratulations. Ukraine's best business radio show “Expert Opinion” is on the air again with new stories of successful Ukrainian business. With you, as always, your Denis Kar. Today, Krania FM will broadcast a story about how language opens the world to people. I am pleased to invite to the conversation my guest Yanina Pikulenko, the founder and director of the LA PAZ foreign language study center. Yanina, I congratulate you.
– Good afternoon. Thank you very much for inviting me. I am very pleased to be here.
Let's get to know each other. Foreign languages are a very competitive field. How did you get the idea, where did it all start, why did you decide to do it?
— You rightly said that competition is fierce in this niche. In general, I never planned that it would be a large language center. I just wanted to teach well at a high level, so that people would have the opportunity to learn the language well. I don't really like the education system in Ukraine. The universities had excellent teachers, real gurus in their field, but the system itself is terrible – printouts, no systematics.
I just wanted to rent one office and teach as I see fit — subjectively, from my point of view, but professionally at the same time, because I have the appropriate education. But it so happened that from one office, where I sat alone for six months, we grew into a network of language schools. Currently, we have more than 50 teachers in the language center, we have two branches – in Zaporizhzhia and Lviv. When you love your profession, you want to convey this love and warmth to people so that there is the right result – that's how it happens.
You know, this is Ukrainian business: we always put our heart into what we do, that's why it turned out that way. Going back to the fact that it's quite a competitive area, what makes your center different? Methodology? Tell us how you really differ from many language schools?
— We are very different, because I know how other centers work. We learn this from teachers who come to us from those centers, or from students.
The first thing is the soul, because I really love my job. We work only with those teachers who enjoy the work process. Every month we have a mandatory training for teachers, where we learn something new. This is not just memorized material that we repeat every day.
Our school has native speakers, with whom we have regular practice. We use exclusively the methods of English-speaking methodologists for English and Spanish-speaking methods for Spanish. We involve foreigners, native speakers, in order to correctly form the material for the lessons. I personally go to study abroad to educational institutions for teachers of Spanish and English.
We have an individual methodology that combines Oxford textbooks and games. Teachers have 30% free work in the lesson: everyone conducts the lesson as they see fit. If they want to jump on the chairs, it is possible. We drink champagne, wine, and eat pizza in class, and this does not interfere with the educational process.
We have mini-groups, which is very important — not 10-15 people. A person cannot speak if there are many people. The focus should be on each person. The most important thing is the soul. I am pleased when people come and say: “God, you have such a nice, cozy place! What other languages do you have?”
By the way, what languages do you speak? English, Spanish?
– English and Spanish are the only languages I speak.
And the most popular?
— 50 for 50. English will always be popular. Spanish is the second most spoken language in the world. Chinese is in first place, followed by Spanish: it is spoken by more than 400 million people, and the third is English. These are the two most popular languages. Why them? Because I know only these languages, and in order to control the methodical process, only these languages can be used.
The name, I understand, is from Spanish?
— Yes, La Paz. I planned that it would be only Spanish, but it turned out that we cannot separate ourselves from English – there is nowhere without it.
We also teach Ukrainian for foreigners. We have excellent specialists. Many people living in Ukraine have a desire to learn the language. These are people who married Ukrainian women or work here. Very nice. We have developed a whole methodology by which we enable people to speak Ukrainian.
Do you only have offline training or do you have online programs as well?
— We have 50 for 50. We work both online and offline.
Today we are talking about languages. This is important: when you know languages, the whole world is open to you. Please tell me, you said that you have two schools, two locations, you opened a new one. Was it because of the large number of people who came in, or did they just decide it was time to expand?
– You can say both. A large number of people, thank God. And the time has come to expand, because you want more. Not even because it became physically impossible to fit in one room.
There was such a situation in Lviv: when we opened, hung a sign, a girl came, I even watched from the window as she approached. She comes in and says, “God, I signed up for you, now you're here!” I was incredibly pleased: it means that it is not just like that, it means that we are needed in Lviv.
We developed very quickly. I planned that the room would be enough for a year, but six months later we could not physically fit. People want to study face-to-face. No matter how convenient online learning is, people want to come. I myself love to teach exclusively offline, because you see a person – some are ashamed to say that they do not understand something. I can see with my eyes that the person did not understand something. Plus coffee, tea, champagne, wine, pizza, jamon.
By the way, you mentioned what makes you different — you do Spanish-speaking and English-speaking parties.
– Oh, what kind of parties?
At least in Lviv and Zaporizhzhia, no one did this. What format?
— Relaxed format. The only condition is that you must speak Spanish and English. People come even with a zero level and leave with a reserve of 20 words per evening. For example:
- Poker Night – we play poker, we have a professional croupier who controls the process. We drink whiskey and speak English. There is a mini-lesson, we always monitor that people speak English.
- Movie Night – we watch a movie in English, and then we discuss: why it happened, which main characters are cool, and which ones are not so great.
- Exclusive parties that have never been seen anywhere before. Mexican Independence Day Celebration – We have Spanish teachers from Mexico. In this way, we honor their day, respect them and show culture. Language is not only lexical turns and grammatical constructions, it is also about how people live.
There was also an “alcohol party” – that's what we called it, because we offered various alcoholic drinks from Latin America: Spain, Argentina, Mexico. Communicating exclusively in Spanish is a language center.
Working with any level – from zero to advanced? Is there an age limit? Perhaps you have children's groups or corporate clients?
— We work with absolutely any level. There are only six of them in the international standard: from zero to C2. We work with people from 6 to 60 years old. That's how I rounded, although we can do more. I had 64-year-old clients – wonderful people who studied well. That's why I always say: there is no such thing as a limit, it's already too late.
We teach children from the age of six, because up to six is a different method. It should be a different setting, environment, it should be a purely children's space, it is a different responsibility. This is completely different. We never force teachers to work with that category of people with whom they are uncomfortable. If we have teachers who say: “I want to work only with children”, then, of course, we will develop this method, we will make repairs. But so far there is no such need, and this is a great responsibility. Personally, I do not work with young children because, as I said, I only teach English and Spanish so that I can control this process.
Yes, we have corporate training. We have a lot of experience: we have been training Aitivians for 8 years. We have developed our own methodology. This is a large area. There were 27 IT companies with which we cooperated. Because of the war, this number has decreased because companies are also struggling. But we work with other large organizations — factories, pharmaceutical companies. Everyone wants to learn English.
Understood You are ready for any challenges. It seems to me that the request gives rise to the development of some new direction in you.
– Yes, it is. I had a situation! In general, I work as a translator. I am a translator by profession, but this is more of a hobby. I remember the call was from the Football Federation of Ukraine. At 9 o'clock in the evening, they came to Zaporizhzhia to hold international matches. They called me and asked: “Can you act as an interpreter?” And I haven't worked with football yet. There are fields that I do not take, for example, medicine, because I do not understand it. Football is more or less an easier vocabulary. And I'm like, “God, I don't know anything about football.” But I say: “Yes, of course, but there is still night.”
I spent the whole night trying to figure out what football was, because I wasn't a fan. I wasn't there then, but now I've seen so many matches that it's a really interesting game. For several years we cooperated with the Football Association of Ukraine. I was very pleased to be able to make this contribution, to help when people were looking for a translator.
Therefore, yes – if tomorrow they say that English is needed for cosmonauts, then we will deal with it 100%. There is nothing that cannot be understood. Of course, medicine is completely different, because we have to be specialists in this.
And other languages - maybe you haven't thought about it yet?
— It all depends on the teachers. If I meet a cool person in my professional life who shares our values with me and wants to teach – why not? We had a German language, a very cool girl. This is my former student. She simultaneously studied to become a translator and teacher of English and German. We met because I taught English there. Then I say: “Ksyusha, you have a beautiful German, let's go.” And she worked for several years, maybe four. Then she changed this field, went to work in an IT company, and we no longer cooperated with another teacher. It depends on the person. If I am confident in a person, then yes.
I have one last question: in your opinion, what is the key when learning a language? It is a teacher, method, motivation – what exactly?
— The first thing, of course, is motivation, but here the work is 50/50. There must definitely be a great teacher – a professional who knows what he is doing, who has a prepared program for the lesson and controls the process. He must be a leader.
But no matter how great the teacher is, if a person does not want to learn, nothing will come of it. This is 100%. But if a person comes super-motivated and wants to learn, and in front of him is a phlegmatic teacher who wants nothing in this life, nothing will work out either. This is 50/50 joint work. No one will put knowledge into a person's head. She has to learn by herself, but she has to be a motivating person.
You know how many cases there have been in my life and among the teachers of our school, when especially children are brought – they really don't want to, but we make them fall in love with this process. If you have really prepared well and show how wonderful life is when you know languages. I love learning languages, because you learn not only the language, but also culture, as I said before, and geography, background knowledge improves, history! Gorgeous! You learn so much about people and then you begin to understand them – why this nation behaves this way and not otherwise.
Indeed, language is not just language, it is much wider and more. Thank you very much for coming, talking about your language center, about your network, about how you feel about it, what is your approach. That's cool. I wish you success. Continue in the same spirit, increase turnover, invite more students and teachers. Help people overcome the barriers that may exist if you don't know the language.
– Thank you very much. Thank you for this opportunity to talk about what we do at school. I also wish you success and great speakers.
Well, friends, that's the topic we had today. Yanina Pikulenko, the founder and director of the LA PAZ foreign language study center, was my guest. This will be the end of our “Expert Opinion” broadcast on Country FM. We help Ukrainian business, we help Ukraine. See you soon, friends.
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