Kate's Story
Growing up as a biracial foster child in a white family and community is a unique experience that has allowed me to understand and appreciate diversity on countless levels from an early age. This upbringing is perhaps why I developed my strongest friendships in college, when I began to engage with a more international student community. During this time, I met students from numerous other parts of the world for the very first time. I wanted to know everything about foreign exchange students and the countries from which they came.
Through countless conversations with them, I began to garner an appreciation for what life was like in their home countries, and it fascinated me. However, it was the language aspect of these interactions that I found to be the most intriguing factor, and I ended up assisting my new friends with their English. This was a pivotal experience in which I realized my interest in becoming a teacher of English as a Second Language.
Through my involvement in the Global Ambassadors’ Club and a TESOL internship during my time at SUNY Cortland College, I helped bring American and foreign exchange students together, striving to help create friendships like the ones I was able to form. I did this by bringing my two interests—language and cultural exchange—together with educational group activities such as conversation and homework groups on campus and outdoor recreational activities such as ice skating.
When an opportunity arose for me to become a foreign exchange student, it only seemed like an obvious next step after getting to know so many of the exchange students at Cortland. During a semester spent in Costa Rica, I made it a point to immerse myself in the local community to ensure I had the most genuine experience of living abroad possible. This required me to leave the comfort zone of having other American students behind, and I spent time with the Costa Rican students instead.
After studying in Costa Rica, I volunteered at a school and orphanage in Honduras. The experience was so rewarding that I decided to continue my travels through Central America in the summer of 2008 before I returned home to the U.S.
Backpacking as a solo female throughout Central America taught me countless amazing skills, such as being flexible and independent. I enjoyed integrating myself as best I could into the local communities wherever I traveled. Then, in my last year of college, I traveled halfway around the world to Southeast Asia. I thoroughly enjoyed my trip to Indonesia and China, but I missed the feel and flavor of life in Latin America. Perhaps it takes a special kind of person to enjoy it, but I actually take great pleasure in hanging halfway out the window on an overcrowded bus full of chickens just to get to a fresh papaya from the local market.
Shortly after graduating Summa Cum Laude and earning my certification in TESOL at SUNY Cortland college, I was awarded a Fulbright grant to work as an English Teaching Assistant at the Universidade Federal do Oeste do Pará (UFOPA) in Santarém, Brazil. The most interesting and engaging aspect of my work during this amazing experience stemmed from the University’s participation in the National Plan for the Training of Basic Education Teachers (PARFOR), which the Brazilian government created in 2009 as part of the CAPES scheme - Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel. This program works with state governments and higher education institutions throughout the country to provide training and, ultimately, accreditation to practicing teachers lacking National Licensure requirements. I helped to develop the curricula for Beginner English classes for English teachers in small remote communities along the Amazon by designing lessons and materials that promoted the development of both language and pedagogical skills.
After many months of preparation, along with the professors from UFOPA, we finally took a five-hour boat trip up the Amazon to the community of Juruti. On the first day of classes, I immediately realized the severe difficulties that the teachers had with basic language and pedagogical concepts. Our textbooks had not arrived, the classrooms were very hot, and there was a lack of technology and other resources. I overcame these challenges by focusing on redesigning lesson plans and creating supplemental materials to address the students’ needs. I engaged students in learning basic language through realistic tasks that they could model directly in their own classroom teaching. Seeing the progression and excitement of the teachers made the experience all the more worthwhile. At the same time, I had an opportunity to conduct research in public schools and private English courses. I realized the problems with the traditional language methodology that was used in these educational programs and recognized the need that many people had for something more authentic and tailored to their needs and interests. Students and teachers struggled inside the classrooms and had few opportunities to practice the language in their everyday lives, especially since many lived in remote communities that took several hours by boat to get to. I hence came up with the idea that online courses with a more modern methodology could help them.
In 2014, I decided to pursue a Master's degree at Albany University in the same field (Teaching English as a Second Language) with the hope of learning more about how I could better help the students in Brazil. For the summer between my first and second year of the Master’s program, I organized a Master’s research project related to training English teachers and online learning using a new methodology - Task Based Language Teaching - for authentic purposes.
Arriving back in Brazil to carry out the project, to my great disappointment, a new problem arose; the professor who had offered to help me write the guidelines for the international project was denied. Frustrated, I decided to stay in Brazil and learn and research on my own. This was the start of my entrepreneurial journey.
I started offering private English classes as a way to support myself. I moved to Rio de Janeiro to look for more opportunities to work and teach. At first, I struggled to gain students; as such, a few months after I arrived in Rio, I moved to the favela Morro do Cantagalo. After experiencing the difficult living conditions in the favela first-hand, I started looking for ways to help out and make a difference. I noticed many kids in my neighborhood didn’t have activities to participate in, and they didn’t spend much time studying outside of school. So, I started providing classes to children in the local community inside my living room. I did the best I could with the limited resources I had.
After a massive uphill battle, I finally made it to the top of the hill in what is considered the best neighborhood in Morro do Cantagalo. After a few negative experiences while trying to continue classes in my private home, I paused the activities to focus on improving my business model and the services I could provide. I sought out books and articles for self-improvement, psychology- neurolinguistic programming, mindset, positive thinking, productivity and organizational skills, time management, business management, online course strategies, entrepreneurship, and many other areas.
The knowledge that I gained helped me implement these strategies to improve my business and overcome my difficult situation. I worked my way from having very few clients right up to teaching executive managers and directors from some of the top multinational companies in Brazil.
One day in 2018, while I was walking through the Brizolão on my way home after giving a class to an executive client in downtown Rio, I heard someone call out my name. A young girl said, “That’s Kate. She’s an English teacher!” On that day, the newly appointed coordinator of the Youth Reference Center (CRJ) invited me to become a volunteer for a space that had reopened after having been abandoned for five years. CRJ is located at the very pinnacle of Morro do Cantagalo and is managed by the General Office for Special Community Action, from the Rio de Janeiro State Government.
I had been involved with the CRJ ever since its reopening in 2018. I used what little resources I had to help clean up the space and organize and coordinate the start of classes; with this in mind, I offered a beginner English course to suit the majority of community residents. I also made improvements to the classroom environment and learning materials as I went along with the money I earned from my private classes.
(For an update about The Youth Reference Center (CRJ) and our project click here)
I started my business because I wanted to be able to offer opportunities to people who otherwise wouldn't have had them, just as I have been given in my life. Having been adopted as a little child along with my two biological brothers, I have received support and care about my well-being and development, access to high-quality educational opportunities, and thus a chance in life.
My biological father was from Sudan. He was an exchange student studying at NYU when my brothers and I were born; in fact, we were all born in NYC, and he wanted to take us back to Africa. We were lucky that the government and social services intervened because they saw that my biological parents weren't well enough to take care of us. I was also lucky that two immensely caring people decided to adopt all three of us.
My adoptive mother worked in social work and lived her life helping other people. She finally fulfilled her dream by adopting my brothers and I. Unfortunately, she passed away from Multiple Sclerosis in 2017, a disease that she was diagnosed with shortly before deciding to open her foster home. Unfortunately, the disease got worse over time. Still, she was an incredibly intelligent woman, and she remained strong and positive despite her challenges. She knew about my plan to start this project in 2016 before I had the space and was still organizing my ideas.
Some of her last words to me were, “Just do it!”
My younger brother Matt passed away in 2012. He studied business at Cornell University, an Ivy League school. He also shared my dream to help others and did social work in his early career. He encouraged me when I told him about my dream to start my own social business after I graduated from college. This is why I’ve been so interested in learning about business and wanting to start my own venture. Their examples gave me the strength to stay here in Brazil by myself, despite the many challenges, because my goal is stronger and so much more influential than all of the struggles that came my way. My goal is to continue their legacies by helping others, wherever I can.
I haven’t been home to New York since I arrived in Brazil in 2014; I have been on a nine-year-long mission to set myself up for this brand new opportunity and project. Throughout this time, I have been able to start and maintain my business, apply for and receive permanent residency, save up to legalize the project, protect the brand name, and launch this website.
I hope to be able to make it home one day soon to see my 82-year-old father, and thank him for all of the opportunities he has so lovingly afforded me in life and show appreciation for what he has given me: a chance to make it in the world.
I plan to share my knowledge about the English language and entrepreneurship with others, with focus on what I've learned and continue to learn during my entrepreneurial journey. Top International Project is a way to connect people with similar interests, creating an opportunity to develop a community of social entrepreneurs.
I strongly believe that the more people who come together for this project, the wider the range of knowledge and skills we’ll have and the bigger the impact we’ll be able to make.