Twenty Five Years On - Fahad Almalik

We recently got a lovely surprise, with an old friend returning to us to study after…25 years!

Fahad Almalik studied here in Portsmouth back in 1989 when things were very different.  So we asked him if he would tell us a little about that time,  and what brought him back here. 

 Lea and Fahad 2015

“My name is Fahad Almalik, and I am from Saudi Arabia.  I work in the Central Bank in the Saudi Arabia Monetary Agency (SAMA).  I work in the currency department, and I am responsible for the issue of currency, which means I supervise the printing and minting of the project, which is outsourced.  I have worked there for 23 years.  Before that I was the Marketing Officer for four years at the Savola Co (The Saudi Vegetable Oil and Ghee Co).

Lea, Fahad, Peter, Allan 1989

When I worked at Savola, they used to send some employees to England to study English.  In 1989 I came here for six months.  When I first arrived, I was at level one.

I actually came with a friend because in the beginning I couldn’t speak at all and he used to translate for me, but by the time I left I spoke very good English.

Recently the Central Bank asked me to get some training. My biggest difficulties in English are meetings, presentations, negotiations and business letters, and because I had such a good experience at LSI (back in 1989) I started looking to see if I could find my old school.  Of course none of the old phone numbers or contacts still worked, but eventually I found LSI again, and I told them I was here 25 years ago, that I knew Peter (Gray) and Allan (Gray) and my teacher was Lea.  They said ‘Yes this is the same school’, but they didn’t tell me whether any of these people were still there, so I was very happy to see Lea, who is now the Vice Principal.

Lea, Fahad, Sara, Marilyn, Sarah, Peter, Julie 1989

I chose to come at this time because it is the school holidays in Saudi at the moment. I have one month in total, so I will come back again later for another two weeks.

Fahad and Lea top right and lads from Omani Navy 1989

I think I was one of the first students to come here the last time. There were four classes and seven teachers.  The school then was a converted house down by the seafront.  Now there are seven floors, about 60 teachers and over 250 students.  The facilities are so different today, with all the IT equipment and smart boards and technology.  I was very surprised by all the changes.  Also there are such a lot of teachers now.  Twenty five years ago we used to do our own social activities, we used to all sit together and decide, a little like a family, but now everything is organised.  All you need to do is take care of your education.”

LSI Student lounge, Whitwell Road, 1989 

Thank you Fahad for talking to us, and for bringing these photos back to show us.  It has been so lovely to see you again, and we really look forward to the next time you come back.

Those Summer Nights....

2013 saw LSI Portsmouth break all records in numbers of students at the school, which in turn meant record numbers of teachers working.  So what better way to say goodbye to a thoroughly enjoyable yet a little exhausting summer than to have our traditional End of Summer Party?
It was great to see faces old and new, enjoy some wonderful food (organised by Hannah) and be fortified with liquid refreshment to help wash it all down. If there was one thing missing it was someone taking photos!  Everyone was enjoying themselves too much to get the cameras out and so all we have are the few pictures here - kindly donated by Angel.  I'm sure you can only agree that it looks like everyone is having a thoroughly fabulous time!  (The photos give the impression that only about ten people attended - this most definitely wasn't the case - there just isn't any evidence to say otherwise!)

From left: Lisa Li, Najat, Andrew, Angel and Peter

From left: Angel, Lisa Li, Ouddy, Karen and Najat

Najat and Peter (Looking a lot more relaxed now!)

Najat, Peter, Angel and Lisa Li

In the background you can just make out: Ed, Cliff, Marion, Gordon, Ceri and Shelton
in the front: Lisa Li, Ouddy, Karen, Najat, Antonio.

The evening was held in the lovely old Bridge Tavern in Old Portsmouth, a wonderfully historic pub brimming with character.  

How Will We Manage?

So it’s a very sweet and sour day here at LSI as one of our really lovely, much loved people is leaving us!  Nati Ruiperez is leaving to have a baby after ten years of working with us at LSI. 

Getting ready to leave

“So Nati how do you feel about leaving?”
“This is my 35th week, and I’ll be going on maternity leave for a year.  I’m a bit nervous, I know things are gonna be fine and everything, I’m just not sure how I’m going to  cope, I have never had so much time not working, though I know Christian (is the name of my baby), will give me a lot to do.”

with students at the Christmas party

“Let’s go back to the beginning, how did you come to work at LSI?”
“Well, I spent the last year of University in Galway in Ireland, on an Erasmus programme, then after I went back to Spain, but I wanted to work abroad again.  So, I applied and was taken on here for work experience for five months.  After the five months was finished I went back to Spain and was on holiday.  Suddenly out of the blue I received a call from Allan (the Marketing Director) who asked me if I wanted to come back to LSI.  Then after some years I met my husband and now I’ve been here ten years!”

with Bill at the leaving ceremony

“Over these ten years what have been the biggest changes?”
“Oh I think the biggest change for me was when Peter and Najat left (the founder of the school and his wife), that was such a big change, and then of course Andrew (the new Principal) coming.
A couple of years after I started here Rosalia started (another Spanish employee) and that was really nice working with another Spanish person, she left three years ago, but we do keep in touch a lot.  I think it can be hard to be in another country if you are not in a couple, you can feel very lonely, without your family or a big group of friends. But I have my lovely husband!
How did I meet my husband? It’s a funny story.  The husband of one of my friends knew my (now) husband and tried to set us up on a date.  So we went out as a group and had a lovely time.  I kind of played hard to get for about five or six weeks, and let him to do the running.  He used to come with me to the Salsa lessons that we had with the students every Wednesday.  After about 6 weeks he asked for a proper date.  I said if he wanted a date he had to ask permission from my parents, I was just joking you know. I had a wedding back in Spain at the weekend and I said if he wanted to ask them he could come to my cousin’s wedding and ask them there!  I never thought in a million years he would take me seriously. So that was on the Wednesday. I had to fly to Spain on the Friday. Can you imagine? On Friday he was knocking on the door with a taxi to take me to the airport!  So he came to the wedding with all my family, cousins and parents but he got on well with everyone and it was really nice. And that was also our first kiss, in front of 150 people!  In Spanish weddings it’s typical to say ‘the mother in law kisses the father in law’ and then they kiss with everyone clapping. They did that to us ‘Nati kisses Richard’ and that was our first kiss, in front of all those people!”

with students at the nightclub

“What do you do here and what will you miss the most?”
“I take care of reception and the social events for the General students, I used to look after the self access for the General students as well. I also look after the General student welfare.  What is the best thing about working here and what will I miss? It has to be the people, the students and my colleagues.  You know after a long time a job is a job but the people here are special and I think I’ll miss the staff the most.”

We'll miss you Nati!

Nati, we will miss you and your lovely smile and all the help you have given us so much, we wish you and Richard and Christian all the love and luck in the world!

If you know Nati - leave a message for her below

New man at the helm!

Andrew Edwards

With Peter now gone we introduce our new principal. Someone who not only has a long teaching and marketing career behind him, but also has keen inspection experience.  Andrew Edwards, 44, came to us from Bristol at the start of 2012 to "do the best possible job to keep the students, the staff and the agents happy" he says.



Andrew with Alan - gaining wisdom from the master ;-)

With a 20 year career in Germany, Italy and the UK, fluency in German and Italian, and also with experience of teaching in the state sector, he brings with him a very fresh, and welcome view on what we do. 

Andrew's experience of working in the accommodation and marketing division, means he not only has new ideas, but the ability to see them to fulfilment, the result being that LSI already has a new self-catering student house available, and has more in the pipeline.

With the recent UKBA regulations LSI, like many schools, had an ISI inspection late last year, and while we are very proud of having had many very successful British Council inspections until now, this was a new experience for us. We were extremely grateful to be able to draw on Andrew's knowledge of inspections from being an IALC inspector since 2007 and the guidance he was able to give us.

Portsmouth, featuring Gunwharf Quays, has a great music scene, an excellent range of restaurants and a lovely long coast line, Andrew has now found his feet in the town and we hope he manages to find time to discover all that the city has to offer, and indulge his love of music, food and running.  We are sure we will have many succesful years working together.

Peter Gray - Hands Over the Reins of LSI

Thursday 13th December, 2012 was a monumental day in the history or LSI - with our great leader, mentor, friend and the founder of LSI, Peter Gray and his wife Najat, handing over the reins of the school to our new principle Andrew Edwards and the new owners of the school  NPTC (Neath Port Talbot College).

Earlier in the year we asked Peter to tell the story of how the school started; “I was 21, had finished University and wasn’t sure what to do.  My brother was in Abu Dhabi at the time and sent me a one-way ticket for a holiday.  I had a great time but they’d only sent me a one-way ticket, so I had to get a job in order to get back again!

“Of course the only job I could get there with a History and Economics degree was teaching English.  So I started to work for a complete cowboy outfit.  I had no experience, I worked there for about a year, and what I learnt was how not to run a school.

 


Very early pic - Entertaining at home - look carefully you can see
a very young Peter and Lea (our Director of Studies)!

“My brother Allan then moved to Sharjah in the Emirates.  Somehow I found myself there and set up a tiny school.  At that stage I was literally living under the classroom furniture.  The Queen had just visited and we ended up naming ourselves the ‘Queens Language Institute’.  Unfortunately our Indian office manager couldn’t pronounce ‘Qu’ and it came out as ‘Coons Ingleesh Langwidjee Institutie’ but it didn’t hold us back!

A few years passed and Peter returned to England.



Peter with an Executive student at Whitwell Road

“I asked Allan if he wanted to join me in starting a school in England, and we found a lovely place in a rural setting, which turned out to be a huge mistake, being in the wrong place.  The students who came over wanted to be in the town with all the facilities a town has to offer, and we were out in the sticks.  Anyway, after two and a half years we were effectively bankrupt.  So we moved to a much smaller, cheaper place in Portsmouth, and found a nice bank manager who helped us with a loan.  Bit by bit it started developing again.  We had about three students and six staff!”

 As time went by they realised they had to either close or expand. They made the decision to move into new premises and then after a couple of years decided to move again.

Peter with some of our lovely Arab students
at Whitwell Road

 “We were very lucky and found a much bigger place, and relatively cheaply.  Slowly we grew into it.  And then we had a brilliant piece of luck: a property developer wanted the premises and offered us a stupid offer for the building to turn it into a theme pub.  The choice then was to either get out while we were ahead or to take the next leap.  Once again we found an incredibly cheap, very large building.  I think our success has been partly luck and partly instinct.  We moved into our new building and today we have an eight floor school which is actually now one of the top schools in England.  At our busy times we have over 50 teachers.”  



Entertaining students with one of our
favourite host families from the past; Ron and Rosie

So what makes a good and successful language school? Peter continues: “The actual key point for a successful language school is to be able to keep quality staff together.  You’ve got to not be seasonal and not be too specific, as there are always problems at some time, like SARS or the Gulf war, which can stop certain nationalities coming.  Because you have good teachers you have good results and then the students tell friends, they come back or send others, and on it goes.  Our facilities are second to none.  I would say good marketing and PR is a good recipe for success.

“The best and the worst thing about owning a school is the same thing; it’s the people: it’s the students and the teachers.  It’s the biggest pain and is also the thing I’ve enjoyed the most”.


Peter and Najat are taking a very well deserved holiday for a few months.  When asked what Peter and Alan intend to do in the future?

“Both of us have a lot of projects in the pipeline, but at the same time we don’t want to cut ties totally with LSI, after all these years, we have invested so much of our lives to making this the successful place it is, so I would have to say just watch this space!”

So, Thursday 13th came, and there were speeches, presents and a lot of reflecting, particularly from the staff who have been with the school a long time.  Tears were shed, but at the same time, as Lea (the Director of Studies said in his speech) when is a good time to leave a business like this? 'When it is running very successfully and you still have your health' so although we are all sad at Peter's leaving, he is wished only wonderful things for his future, and we know we will see him again in some capacity or another (or maybe just in the pub!).



Allan - Peter - Lea
Three friends - together for 28 years
Peter at his farewell party

On the Saturday (15th), we had our annual Christmas party. which was more of a celebration of Peter's time at LSI (as opposed to the sadness of the Thursday), and Lea gave a lovely speech telling of the history of the school.  The following video shows the presentation in a pictorial form.