Vicky Liu represents her graduating class from the Summer 2011 ESL program. She shares her story of arriving in Canada from China in December and joining the ESL program in January. She discusses the diversity of her classmates from different countries and cultures, and how she had to work hard and learn quickly to succeed in the program. Her teachers motivated and encouraged the students to never give up, and helped them gain confidence and skills for future academic success. Vicky is thankful for the support of her teachers and classmates, and feels more prepared to take on future academic challenges.

1. Good morning dear students, instructors and ESL
program staff,
My name is Vicky Liu and it is my honor to
respresent the graduating class of Summer 2011.
Thank you for letting me share this amazing day in
my life with you.
Let me share my story and expain why I feel so
proud of myself and my classmates on this day. I
arrived to Canada from China in December of last
year. I have joined this program in January of 2011
and has learned a lot about Canadian academic life
since that day. When I arrived to Pearson Airport
and noticed the diversty of people in the airport, I
realized that my life is not going to be the same and
I will have to learn many new things. In China, all of
my classmates were Chinese; we shared a common
language and one culture, whereas in my ESL class I
had classmates from three different countries. Even
my Chinese classmates spoke Cantonese, which
added another level of challenge. I had to learn

2. many new things and fast. Right from the first class
in my ESL program, the instructor came up to me
and said, “It is your choicewhich language you want
to speak, but if you do not speak English, you will
lose your mark”. This comment coming from my
teacher first scared me as I thought things are not
going to be easy in this program and motivated me
as I thought I need to focus on my priorities which
was to improve my language skills so that I can
prepare for my academic program. On a different
occasion, another teacher used a metaphor of an
ocean which was English language in which we are
immersed and a coast as our native language. We
want to swim back to that coast every time we are
stressed or confused, but I made a decision for
myself to become a good swimmer and learn how
to survive the turbulent waters of the English
language. I knew that I had to work hard and
remain positive in the final outcome. I also feel that
I could not survive in that ocean without the
support of my teachers and my classmates. I have

3. learned a lot from my teachers, Scott, Olga,
Nataliya, Ben, Katrina, Mark, and Yasmin about
their experience of language learning, future
challenges in academic life, as well as critical skills
for academic success. Our teachers helped us
develop confindence in our future, and encouraged
us to never give up no matter how many
assignments we need to finish and now matter how
challenging those assignments were. We were
exposed to many types of assignments and now we
feel more prepared to our future academic study. I
would also want to thank Bill Hodges and ESL
Program staff for their support and effective
coordination of our study.
I must say that I have learned a lot from my
fellow-swimmers, my classmates, all of whom have
become my friends. I know now that if I go to their
coutries I have a place to stay and a good guide who
will show me around their country. My classmates
helped me learn by sharing their expriences,

4. developing my group-work skills and expanding my
cultural horizons. I have learned something about
their cultures, I know how to count from one to ten
and say “hello” and “good bye” in Arabic and
Korean. We became friends who share good and
bad times together, laugh and cry about the same
things. We learned how to be patient with each
other , how to resolve conflicts and disagreements
and how to prepare assignments effectively.
Now as we graduate from ESL program, we
have vast oceans ahead of us. We have to learn
many things in our future academic fields, yet we
feel more confident in the previously unknown
waters of the English language and know that there
are many fellow swimmers who will readily share
their journey with us.
Thank you for attention and the best of luck in
your future academic studies.