Sunny Man Chu Lau
Dr. Lau, Associate Professor in the School of Education at Bishop’s University, Québec, is Canada Research Chair (Tier 2) in Integrated Plurilingual Teaching and Learning. She specializes in critical literacies, second language and plurilingual education, teaching English as a second language, participative-based research methodologies, and related teacher education. As a long-time teacher/educator, Dr. Lau has designed and delivered curricula with specific purposes for English language learners across levels in Canada and overseas. Specializing in second language and plurilingual education, she offers courses for pre-service ESL teachers and those related to language and literacy at the graduate level.
Marie-Claude Brosseau
Marie-Claude enseigne au Département de littérature et de communication du Cégep de Sherbrooke depuis plus de quinze ans. Responsable d’encadrement en Tremplin DEC pendant plusieurs années, elle est engagée dans l’enseignement aux étudiants et aux étudiantes de première année. Elle offre régulièrement les cours Renforcement en français et Lire et écrire en français au cégep. Elle contribue aussi au Centre d’aide en français auprès des étudiants et des étudiantes en situation de handicap. Elle s’intéresse aux questions de littératie, d’enseignement de la langue française de même qu’à la diversité culturelle en enseignement supérieur. Elle collabore à la recherche action sur le plurilinguisme depuis les débuts du projet en 2017.
Melissa Blandford
Meet the Team
Below are the project members and the backgrounds of their collaboration.
Melissa has been a member of the Modern Languages Department at the Cégep de Sherbrooke for the last twenty-two years, three of which she worked as the department coordinator. She is a mother to "special needs" children adopted from China, Vietnam, and Quebec and a former local volunteer supporting Bhutanese refugees arriving from Nepal (along with her Nepali-born husband). These experiences gave her a rare first-hand perspective of plurilingual and pluricultural education and led her to become an MA candidate at Bishop's University under the thesis supervision of Dr. Sunny Man Chu Lau and one of the founding teacher-collaborators of this action research project since 2017. She has been actively engaged in supporting students who struggle in language and literacy skills.
Mikhael Kowalak
Mikhael has taught English as a second language for over twelve years in high schools, adult education, businesses and CEGEPs. Originally from Germany, he has taught German as well. Since 2015, he has given most English courses offered at the Cégep de Sherbrooke. He has been involved in committees working on issues such as interculturality, the integration of minorities and sensitive topics in language teaching. Since 2019, he has been involved in this research team conducting action-research on plurilingual pedagogies. This collaborative project aims to support the academic development of not only immigrant students but also all other students.
Michèle Le Risbé
Michèle enseigne au Département de littérature et de communication du Cégep de Sherbrooke depuis près de 15 ans. Elle a enseigné tous les cours de la formation générale ainsi que les cours Renforcement en français et Lire et écrire en français au cégep. Elle a mis sur pied le Centre d’aide en littérature (CALI) qui a près de 10 ans d’existence. Depuis 2017, elle fait partie du groupe de recherche sur le plurilinguisme. Cette communauté d’apprentissage lui permet de s’intéresser à la littératie et de réfléchir à l’enseignement plurilingue et pluriculturel.
Elisabeth Maegerlein
Maria Chelkowska
Elizabeth is a member of the Modern Languages Department at the Cégep de Sherbrooke, where she teaches ESL. She is one of the founding teacher-collaborators of this collaborative action research project.
Maria enseigne au Département de philosophie du Cégep de Sherbrooke depuis plus de 10 ans. Responsable d’encadrement en Tremplin DEC pendant quelques années, elle est particulièrement engagée dans l’enseignement aux étudiants et aux étudiantes de première année. Elle offre régulièrement les Ateliers d’aide en Philosophie au cégep. Depuis 2019, elle participe à ce projet recherche action sur les approches pédagogiques plurilingues.
Sylvie Breault
Sylvie enseigne au département des Techniques administratives du Cégep de Sherbrooke et est chargée de cours à l’École de Gestion de l’Université de Sherbrooke depuis plus de 20 ans. Sa collaboration depuis 2019 au projet de recherche action sur le plurilinguisme se greffe parfaitement à son parcours de formation continue et d’expériences professionnelles en langues modernes et en commerce international. Elle a pu notamment développer ses intérêts et ses compétences interculturelles par son immersion comme enseignante en Équateur, à titre d’officier d’infanterie au Canada, de contrats de traduction d’outils pédagogiques (Ordre professionnel du Canada) et de révision d’ouvrages spécialisés sur l’international. De 2003 à 2014, elle a été conseillère pédagogique et responsable du développement de la Mobilité étudiante internationale du Cégep de Sherbrooke. Enfin, ayant obtenu le titre de CA (CPA et auditrice), elle a démarré son propre cabinet d’expertise comptable auprès d’une clientèle diversifiée et qui encourage l’engagement de personnel issu de l'immigration.
Research Assistants
Alexandra Lebeau
Alexandra has been working on related research projects as a Research Assistant since 2017. She is currently doing her Master of Arts in Education under the supervision of Dr. Lau at Bishop’s. She completed her BA in Modern Languages (English, Spanish and Japanese) and a Minor in TESL at Bishop’s in 2019. Language learning has become a vivid interest of hers since her arrival at Bishop’s and the start of her TESL minor. While French is her first language, she is a curious learner of English, Spanish, Japanese, Mandarin and Arabic. In her own research, she hopes to explore further teachers’ attitudes regarding their plurilingual and pluricultural students.
Coralie Daoust
Coralie has been a Research Assistant for this project since 2021. She is currently finishing her BA in Modern languages (Spanish and Japanese) with a minor in TESL. She has always been fascinated by languages and cultures in the world since she speaks French, English and is learning Spanish and Japanese. She also has some knowledge of Mandarin and Italian. Her interest in plurilingual and intercultural teaching was developed when having Dr. Sunny Lau as her teacher, which prompted her to start a minor in TESL and work on these projects.
Julia Charron
Julia has been a Research Assistant for the project since 2020. She is in the final year of her BA, majoring in Educational Studies and minoring in Teaching French as a Second Language. She looks forward to continuing her work within resource development as she completes her Bachelor of Education in the coming years. Integrated plurilingual and intercultural pedagogy has become her key passion since her arrival at Bishop’s, and she hopes to incorporate many plurilingual teaching and learning strategies into her elementary classroom post-graduation.
Ai Di
Di has worked as a Research Assistant since 2021. She was a university ESL teacher before and completed her Master of Arts in language study in Beijing Foreign Studies University. She has recently graduated from her Master of Education at Bishop’s. She is originally from China and speaks Mandarin and English and has some knowledge of French. She has extensive experience in second language teaching and is interested in research related to language teaching.
