During the 8th Annual DR-TESOL International Convention held in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, Graduate School of Education (GSE) Dean José Luis Alvarado, Ph.D., and associate dean Diane Rodriguez, Ph.D., presented at the “United for a Bilingual Republic”-themed event. More than 1,000 TESOL teachers attended, including local and foreign specialists from the United States, Puerto Rico, Cuba, Colombia, Panama and Mexico.
Juan Valdez, president of DR-TESOL, noted they are committed to the Dominican Republic passing a law that every child who attends public schools in the country should be bilingual in English and Spanish, an effort which the GSE is quite interested in supporting. In fact, Rodriguez is spending a sabbatical in the DR to establish a teacher exchange program and to support the training of TESOL teachers in the Dominican Republic.