Call me Katie.
Everybody has since secondary school and if this doesn’t tell you how much I loved England and English language, then maybe picking Teaching English Language and Literature as my university subject does. I would go to England for my summer holidays since I was 18 and I picked this subject mostly for my love of English. During my studies, I was really motivated to teach and that was how I found a teaching job at a primary school right after I finished my master’s degree. That was the end of student life and the beginning of adulthood, and to say goodbye to that period in my life I decided to go to England one last time. During that summer holiday, I decided that I didn’t want to return to Slovakia just yet. I discussed this with the school where I was supposed to teach in September, and with my parents who said I can always come back to Slovakia and if I want to try my luck abroad this was the time. So I stayed in England. Thanks to my English skills I found a job in the digital aviation industry. My grammar and pronunciation were so good that native speakers assumed I was American or Australian. I travelled for work a lot. I spent 6 weeks in Dubai working for the Emirates and another 6 weeks in Mexico City working for Aeroméxico. I spent 10 months in Amsterdam where I was helping KLM Royal Dutch Airlines with software. During my time there I fell in love with the Netherlands and I decided to move there. I requested a transfer within my company and I was able to work at the headquarters in Amsterdam. Now I work for Maintenance and Engineering at KLM.
It has been 6 years since I left Slovakia. For years I lived in a small town close to London and almost 2 years I have lived in the Netherlands. I wouldn’t be able to achieve any of this without my English studies, without the hard work of university professors who motivated us to learn and grow and always improve our language skills. I now love reading English books (I was really struggling with this during university), I speak to myself in English, and I dream in English.
People say that you should pick your profession and then study the field. I feel like picking Teaching English Language and Literature opened more doors than just the teaching one and helped me go further than I ever dreamed.