To have another language is to possess a second soul.

New Heights maintain a low teacher-to-student ratio of 1:10 for beginners and 1:14 for more advanced students to ensure that everyone receives the personalized attention and support from the instructor needed to encourage their growth in English.  Online classes have a limit of 1:8.

The price for the class remains the same regardless of how many students are enrolled. Having lower class numbers means students will be able to get more individual attention to improve faster, while having the class limit at the maximum means more of your employees can benefit from English classes.

Research has shown there are many factors impacting people's ability to learn languages.  These include age, prior exposure to English, similarity of students' native languages to English / Spanish (in terms of grammar/alphabet, etc.), their social networks, attitude and emotions surrounding language learning (fear of being laughed vs. seeing language learning as a fun challenge), etc. However, the most important factor is possessing a desire to succeed and constant, continuous practice on a daily basis. 

For local groups, the instructor also informs students about opportunities and places where they can go to meet Americans to get additional practice outside of the classroom, such as MeetUp.com or Flagpole.com. Students at McLane in Athens have been invited to go play Petanque with the local Petanque Club on the weekends. 

Ultimately, language learning is a marathon - not a sprint! 

Absolutely! New Heights welcomes different companies partnering together in support of their employees' futures. Please reach out to any businesses you know who may be interested. When doing so, please take into consideration which worksite will provide the classroom space (if doing in-person classes) and the scheduling needs of each business. If neither company is able to host the class, New Heights can rent a classroom for an additional cost. 

Alternatively, if your company has branches in different states, consider combining those workers with your own employees in one of the online classes to increase student numbers. 

If you don't know any other companies who might be interested, you may also write to New Heights to inquire about if there are any other businesses currently looking for partners for either online or on-site classes.

 1) Evaluations of prospective students completed
2) Signed course policy mandatory and payment agreement from students  
(if students are paying portion of course)
3) Facilitate online meeting with instructor “Meet and Greet” technology check (for online classes)
4) First payment upfront (prepaid)
5) Projector and/or large whiteboard and quiet classroom area (for onsite classes) 

It's no secret that they key to language learning is PRACTICE! However, New Heights realizes that your workers also have very busy lives. As such, employees should expect to do about 1 hour of homework each week of self-study of vocabulary (especially at the beginner levels as repetition is key!) 

For the Gold Package, optional homework can also be given at the higher levels for those motivated students who want to level up their language abilities quicker and receive more individualized feedback.  For the optional homework, students are asked to write about whatever they want. (Due to time constraints, writing is not focused on in class).  

To progress as fast as possible, it is extremely important employees attend class regularly.  To ensure that your money is well spent, New Heights encourages having strict attendance policies that should be discussed with your employees in their native language prior to them enrolling in the English classes.  Ultimately, your company decides how many classes your employees can miss based on personal circumstances. For attendance, New Heights recommends that employees have at least 80% attendance rate for progress to be seen.

With your employees’ permission, classes can be recorded for online classes in case of absences.  However, these are interactive classes so they should do their best to attend. Onsite classes are not recorded.
 

Allowing your employees' family members to attend classes with them is a great employee benefit you can provide to your workers - showing you care not only about them, but also about their families. Plus, it will give your employees someone to practice the skills they learn in class with at home and help hold them accountable. 

Some companies may also want to consider allowing family members to attend for a discounted price to help subsidize the cost. For example, the worker's spouse might pay 50% of the price of his/her tuition for the class, and your company would pay for the other 50%.

Many non-native English speakers in our community are unable to pay for quality English classes on an ongoing basis and would love your help in providing this valuable service! 

However, while employees will love it if you are offering them free language classes, experience has taught us that it is also good for them to have some skin in the game.  This should help with regular attendance and hold them accountable to their commitment to learn English. 

Requiring workers to pay a portion of the class, giving them a refundable deposit (contingent on good attendance records), incentivizing them for class completion, or financially penalizing them for excessive missed classes without documentation will help hold them accountable and on task while learning languages.  

TPRS is used primarily with beginning students as a way of providing the constant repetition and reinforcement that is critical for new learners within an engaging and fun context. If you have ever watched a toddler learn to speak, you know that it takes multiple hours of them being in comprehensible contexts for them to start to associate words with their meanings. In a nutshell, TRPS is the fast-track version of this learning process we experience growing up in our native languages by providing adults with understandable contexts so they can start to speak English / Spanish as fast as possible! 

Also, a significant portion of the TPRS part of the class emphasizes the high frequency vocabulary in English that native speakers use in daily conversations with the focusing being on getting students talking in simple sentences as quickly as possible. For example, words like ‘I, You, He/She, etc.’ or basic verbs such as ‘to be, to go, to want, etc.’ are common words American use daily and will be focused on. However, words like ‘spaghetti’ are highly irregularly (unless you are in an Italian family!) When was the last time you said “spaghetti?” 😉   

For the 14-week Gold, Silver, and Bronze class packages, there will be 3 billing cycles. The first billing cycle will consist of any prior assessment evaluations for new students + the first four weeks of classes and will be billed prior to the classes beginning. The second billing cycle will be at the four-week mark of the classes, and the final billing at the 8-week mark for the remainder of the classes. Any optional post-assessments will be billed after completion of these assessments. 

For the 8-week online reading group, the prior assessment evaluations + the first half of the payment will be billed before the classes start. The second billing cycle will be at the halfway mark of the classes (4 weeks).