Academic staff
Edward Bressan
Academic Director and Principal Lecturer
BA Dip Ed (Melb.) MPhil. (Dublin) MBA (Open)
Email: ebressan@brookes.ac.uk
Telephone: +44 (0) 1865 484107
My role is to provide academic leadership in Oxford Brookes International, including the development of our courses in line with market needs and to ensure that the quality of these programmes is maintained and steadily enhanced.
I joined Brookes in April 2003. Previously I held academic leadership positions in Dublin Business School and the University of New South Wales, Institute of Languages. I speak French and Italian and have worked in both France and Italy – in Arras as a high school teaching assistant and Milan in corporate banking.
My main teaching and research interests are in the area of Business Studies.
Dr Sara Hannam
Deputy Academic Director and Senior Lecturer
BA (Hons) Liverpool, M(Ed) Sheffield, PhD (Sheffield), CTEFLA, DELTA
Email: shannam@brookes.ac.uk
Telephone: +44 (0) 1865 484377
My role is to assist the Director in providing academic leadership and the development of quality courses that continue to meet the needs of international students. I also teach and am involved in teacher development activities.
I joined Brookes in 2011. I previously held an academic leadership position at City College, Thessaloniki, Greece (Faculty of the University of Sheffield), as well as being involved in teacher education and development at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece. I have extensive experience of course development at all levels of EAP, study skills and content provision such as Language and Identity in Europe and other modules relating to cultural studies, sociolinguistics, applied linguistics and politics. I have been an oral examiner for all UCLES language examinations. I was on the Coordinating Committee of IATEFL and am currently a member of EL-Com. I write a regular column for IATEFL voices and publish my work in other journals and conference proceedings. I am involved in 2 funded research projects - Language Rich Europe (EU funded) and English in Europe (Leverhulme Trust funded). I am a reviewer for the International Journal of Applied Linguistics.
My research interests are: Critical Applied Linguistics and EAP, Bringing Diversity to EAP, Neo-Liberalism and English Language Teaching and Learning in the Balkans (doctoral research), Multilingualism and the EU.
Mary Davis
Pre-Master's Subject Co-ordinator
BA (Hons), RSA Cert TEFLA, RSA Dip TEFLA, MA in TESOL
I manage the Pre-Master’s Diploma and Certificate, which prepare students for postgraduate study through a focus on study skills and English for Academic Purposes. I have worked on these courses since 2004 and have enjoyed developing, researching and improving the course structure and content to make them as effective as possible for our students. I joined Oxford Brookes in 2002, after spending about 15 years teaching overseas, in Germany, France, Spain, Japan, Sri Lanka and Uruguay.
My research interests include the development of academic literacy, the formative use of Turnitin in academic writing, the role of reusable academic phrases in writing and the use of technology in learning. I am currently undertaking PhD research at the Institute of Education, University of London, into the development of source use in postgraduate writing.
Fiona Gilbert
In-sessional Subject Co-ordinator, Senior Lecturer and Teaching Fellow
BA, RSA Dip. TEFLA, MA TEFL
I am responsible for the undergraduate academic English service at Oxford Brookes which consists of both credit bearing modules and non credit support. I have been at Oxford Brookes since 2000.
My teaching experience includes 20 years teaching English abroad in Greece and Spain. The last post I held abroad was with the British Council in Spain where one of my roles was a teacher trainer with the local government. I also have several years experience in teacher training in Britain, my first role was a trainer on a government funded Trinity Cert TESOL and NVQ trainer and assessor. I am also a CELTA trainer and managed the CELTA course here at Oxford Brookes. My professional qualifications and training include an RSA Diploma and an MA TEFL from Reading.
I am an Oxford Brookes teaching fellow. My current pedagogic interests are teacher education, e learning, discipline specific academic English provision, academic literacy, assessment in Higher Education, written assignment tasks. I am currently carrying out pedagogic research into written assignment task briefs.
Richard Haill
Lecturer
MA in Applied Linguistics, MA in French (Film & Literature), Post-graduate Certificate of Education (TEFL), BA Hons in French and English Literature
A career in teaching English has given me wonderful opportunities to teach abroad. All together I spent 14 years teaching English in schools, universities and for the British Council abroad: starting in Western Europe (Switzerland, France and Spain), I gradually moved farther east, spending several years in Croatia, Egypt and Singapore. A lot of my work in Singapore involved training local teachers, and when I came back to Britain in 1987, I spent a year in Cheltenham working on CELTA courses. In 1988 I came to Oxford Polytechnic, as it then was, and the English Language Unit was formed.
My main role has of course changed over time: I was initially involved in setting up new modules and running lots of CELTA and Introduction to TEFL courses. In more recent years my time has been mainly devoted to teaching a wide range of foundation and undergraduate modules and to carrying out administration duties, in particular admissions and timetabling. In 2011 I moved from a full-time to a half-time role as ‘Lecturer’. My teaching is now mainly focussed on the International Foundation Diploma course, where I run modules on Modern British Cinema and on Contemporary British Studies, as well as teach on other English for Academic Purposes modules.
Lisa Hale
University English Subject Co-ordinator
BA, RSA Cert TEFLA, RSA Dip TEFLA
After graduating with a degree in Communication Studies with English Literary Studies, I spent two years teaching English in Milan and Paris. On returning to the UK, I studied for my RSA Dip TEFLA and worked at a large language school in London. I worked there for thirteen years, the last five as the Director of Studies. While at this school, I was also lucky enough to be sent to work in Switzerland and Boston, USA.
I joined Oxford Brookes in 2003 on the International Summer School. I currently manage the University English programme, which is designed to improve students’ academic English skills so they can study at a foundation, undergraduate or postgraduate level.
I am particularly interested in the area of e-learning and the use of technology in learning and teaching.
Helen Hawari
Assistant Subject Co-ordinator for Foundation Programmes
BEd MA(TEFL), MA International Relations, PG Cert in Management, PG Diploma in Marketing.
After taking my first degree in History at The University of London I spent the first two years of my working life teaching English, Drama and History to Secondary school children in London. I then travelled to the Middle East to pursue my interest in that region's history and taught English to university students there. In 1986 I returned to the UK and completed my Master's degree in TEFL at the University of Reading. I then returned to the Middle East where I worked for the British Council for eight years as Director of their Training Centres in the West Bank and Gaza. I subsequently worked as an administrative manager for the United Nations in the Middle East and then for the World Health Organisation as their Human Resources Manager in their headquarters office in Denmark.
I have recently completed a Diploma in marketing and a second Master's degree in International Relations. I am interested in management, intercultural and ethical issues, language, rhetoric, conflict and power and how all that informs language teaching and learning.
Juliet Henderson
University Teacher - University English and International Foundation Diploma
BA, MA Intercultural Communication, Dip TEFL
I teach Intercultural Communication and English for Academic Purposes on the International Foundation Diploma and the English for University Studies course. I am very interested in developing ways of teaching English as an intercultural language, and encouraging awareness of intercultural issues across the university.
My present research is focused on these two areas. I spent my childhood living in England, fifteen years as an adult living in Paris, France, and have a second career - I'm a painter.
Garry Maguire
In-Sessional Postgraduate Support Subject Co-ordinator
RSA Dip MA TEFLA
I have worked for more than twenty years in ELT as a teacher and trainer, initially in France and Spain on EGP, ESP and British Council INSET programmes. Following 5 years as a TESOL and NVQ trainer and assessor I joined Oxford Brookes in 2001. My main duties now centre on the academic development of the International Summer Programme, undergraduate modules in critical reading for academic purposes and coordinator of the Academic English support for postgraduate students.
Following several years of research into task-processing conditions and second language acquisition, my main current interest now lies in the area of initial teacher trainee cognitive styles and teacher education course input delivery modes. I am also engaged in action research into critical academic reading syllabus, materials and test design.
Martin Millar
Senior Lecturer
MA in English Language and Linguistics, MSc in Applied Linguistics
I studied English Language and Linguistics at the University of Edinburgh 1973-77, and after graduating I worked as a Research Assistant in the Department of Linguistics for a year. I then took up a position as an English Language Teacher at a government-training centre in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. After four years there, I returned to Edinburgh - my hometown - to do an MSc in Applied Linguistics. In 1983 I was appointed to a position at the University of Hiroshima, where I taught a variety of English language and linguistics courses, to undergraduate and post-graduate students. Upon my return to the UK in 1990, I worked for two years at the Centre for English Language Teaching at the University of Stirling. I took up my present position here at what was then Oxford Polytechnic in 1992.
My research interests are language attitudes, and academic progress of international students who have graduated from our Foundation programmes.
Jean Sargent
University Teacher - English for Academic Purposes
PhD. [London], MA [Cantab.]
Currently, I am Module Leader for Foundation Economics and Business Studies, and also teach English for Academic Purposes on a range of courses, including, English for University Studies and various in-sessional courses.I have been teaching in Higher Education since 1979, mostly Economics and Development Economics, but also English for the past 7 years. As well as Oxford Brookes, I have in the past taught Economics and Development Economics at the University of London [Birkbeck College], the University of Westminster and the University of Reading.
My PhD thesis is entitled ‘Poverty, Growth and Stagnation in North Indian Agriculture, A Comparative Study in the Political Economy of Poverty Generation in Western and Eastern Uttar Pradesh’. I did my PhD studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, and was awarded my Ph.D. for this thesis in 1991. I spent some time in India collecting the data on which it is based. In 1996 I worked as a research assistant at the University of Oxford’s International Development Centre at Queen Elizabeth House, where, in collaboration with Dr Barbara Harriss-White, I researched and wrote an academic paper for presentation at a conference at the University of Madras, on female infanticide in South India, entitled ‘Development, Property and Deteriorating Life Chances for Girls in India’
My special interests obviously lie within the field of development. However, within a teaching context I am particularly interested in the best ways to teach complex content materials, e.g. economics, to non-native speakers. I am especially concerned with finding how to most effectively overcome the difficulties learners have when confronted not only with new vocabulary, but new lexis that carries with it a great deal of underlying conceptual content.
Sally Warner
University Teacher – English for Academic Purposes
MA(Hons); RSA Cert TEFLA; RSA Dip TEFLA; MEd (Applied Linguistics)
I am a teacher and module leader on the University English programme and I sometimes teach on in-sessional modules too. I particularly enjoy writing classroom materials and trying to strike the right balance so that the students will enjoy their classes whilst learning new things.
Before starting at Oxford Brookes in 2002, I worked abroad for ten years at universities and language schools in Poland, Belgium and Jordan; by 2008, I was missing being overseas so much that I spent my summer holidays teaching in Oman.
My main interests lie in academic writing as well as the psychology of learning and I recently completed a Psychology course with the Open University. When I’m not teaching at Brookes, I also work as a teacher trainer.
Teresa Woodbridge
Foundation Programmes Subject Co-ordinator
MA(Oxon) RSA DipTEFL
My work responsibilities include Course Co-ordinator for the International Foundation Diploma and Foundation Diploma in Liberal Arts. I have taught in Spain, Italy, Scotland and England over a period of more than 30 years. My research interest is the development of exams.
Anne Prince
University Teacher 
BA & MA (Oxon), RSA Cert & Dip TEFLA, LCCI Cert Teaching Business English, IL Dip Translation, MA TESOL.
I am Module Leader for two modules on the University English pathways programme. These modules introduce international students to academic study skills and EAP and prepare them for progression onto undergraduate and postgraduate courses. I have worked on these courses since 2005 and have developed their structure and content to meet the current needs of students. I also teach on a range of Undergraduate and Postgraduate Academic English support modules.
I joined Oxford Brookes in 2005, and my previous teaching experience spanned 15 years of teaching in the UK, Italy, Sweden and Peru, and included EAP, ESP, Business English and Teachers’ courses. I also write EAP materials and tests for Oxford University Press.
My areas of academic interest are the development of academic literacy, student use of feedback and academic reading and writing materials development.
Deborah Post
University English Lecturer in EAP 
BA (Philosophy), Cambridge DELTA, MA (TESOL)
I teach Academic English on the University English Programme and am module leader for Academic Reading 1, Academic Language Development 2 and Research 3. I am also deputy to the manager of University English and assist students with their progression onto foundation, undergraduate or postgraduate courses.
I joined the department in 2011. Previously I taught Academic English at the University of Bath before moving to Oxford to become manager of an international foundation programme. I have taught Academic and General English in a number of international colleges in the UK, as well as in Asia.
Marilena Di Gennaro
University Teacher 
MA TESOL (Reading), Bachelor of Education (Hons.) in French with English (Reading), RSA CERT.TEFL, RSA DIP.TEFL, CSCT Certificate in Counselling Theory and Practice (Westminster College), Diploma in Teaching One-to-One (ARELS, London)
I joined the International Centre at Oxford Brookes in 2005 to teach on the University English programme and in-sessional courses. As module leader for Academic Writing 4 and Listening and Speaking 3, my duties include writing materials, running, teaching and assessing these courses and supporting students as a personal tutor.
I started my professional life as a teacher of French then retrained to teach English as a Foreign/Second Language. Subsequently, I taught in France, Italy, the USA and the UK. Here I taught on refresher courses for teachers, examination preparation classes, and individually tailored 1:1 and business courses for many years. I speak and continue to study Italian, French and Spanish. In addition, I am an examiner for both the Cambridge Examinations Speaking Tests and the IELTS.
My current areas of interest include the use of technology in formative feedback, intercultural communication and its effect on group dynamics, academic literacy and the testing of speaking.
Louise Green
Associate Lecturer & Dissertation Checking Co-ordinator 
BA (Hons), MA in Education (Applied Linguistics), RSA Cert. TEFLA, RSA Diploma TEFLA
I teach EAP on pre-sessional and in-sessional programmes at both undergraduate and post-graduate level. I also tutor on the Oxford Centre for Staff and Learner Development (OCSLD)’s Teaching International Students on line course and lead workshops for staff on internationalization. I co-ordinate OBI’s Dissertation Checking Service.
Before joining Oxford Brookes International in 2008, I worked in France, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Latvia and Ukraine, mainly for the British Council, as a teacher/teacher trainer on a range English for Specific Purposes courses. In my last post in Ukraine, I co-ordinated the British Council’s Peacekeeping English Project there, working with Ukrainian Armed Forces and international partners to support teachers preparing military personnel for international operations and peacekeeping duties.
My professional interests include fostering intercultural awareness and e-learning. I am also passionate about language learning and bilingualism.
Stephen Thomas
Associate Lecturer 
BSc (Applied Economics), DELTA, ACCA, completing an MA in Applied Linguistics
I started teaching English to international students in 2002. After initially teaching at language schools in Oxford and London, I moved into the English for Academic Purposes sector at Kingston University and King’s College, London. I joined Oxford Brookes in summer 2011, where I am an Associate Lecturer. I am currently completing the dissertation for an MA in Applied Linguistics which I hope to complete in May 2012 - my research interests are in the area of vocabulary acquisition, and in particular the role this plays in reading competence.
My first degree is in Economics, and prior to teaching my career was in Investment Banking, working as a Market Risk Analyst in London, Tokyo, Sydney and Frankfurt.
When not teaching or studying, I love playing tennis, watching football (especially Spurs), and cycling.
Jill Southam
Associate Lecturer
MA Applied Linguistics, B Sc (Hons) Modern Languages, Cert.Ed., CTEFLA 
I joined Oxford Brookes in 2009 and am currently teaching on the International Foundation Diploma, having also taught Inter-cultural Studies on the EUS programme.
After a first degree in modern languages, I started my career as a lecturer in French and Spanish in Further Education, mainly in Oxford. I later moved to adult Education in London, where I was head of the languages department at the City Literary Institute. I subsequently re-trained in TEFL and applied linguistics, taking up a post at Bournemouth University, where I added EAP and study skills for international students to my teaching portfolio.
I have lived in France, Spain, Armenia and Belarus, and taught English in Avignon and in Barcelona. As might be expected, I speak several European languages.
Dana Wentworth
Associate Lecturer 
B.A.Russian, M.A. Creative Writing, RSA Dip TEFLAI am an Associate Lecturer at Brookes and teach on the University English courses and also IFD and FDLA. I am also doing some work in the Modern Languages Department where I teach French Translation Skills, and currently supervise students doing the Tandem Language Learning module.
I had been involved in teaching, mainly language–related, for many years before joining Brookes in 1996, including the teaching of Russian, and also ESP for Russian and German professionals and academics. At the moment I also work for a French company organising short immersion courses for French business people who come to Oxford.
I first began my Brookes teaching on the International Summer School. I taught on this programme full-time for 15 years, the greater part of which involved teaching on the University Pre-Sessional course. During the semesters I taught for a number of years on the Pre-Master’s course (formerly DELS PG, GP Dip) and the University English course (formerly EUS) and for many years have worked on IFD and FDLA. For the last few years I have been teaching the IFD Literature and Arts in Context module which combines my great interest in history and literature with academic study skills. I am very interested in cultural exchange and this spring will be going for the second time to Grenoble, where I have links with academic staff, both French and English.
My interests include translation skills and theory, teaching critical thinking particularly to support academic writing skills, the relationship between language and cultural identity, and etymology and the history of language and its application to academic vocabulary acquisition.
