The new Arabic program at The Hill School (Pottstown, Pa.) has people talking.
With the arrival this year of instructor Yassine Benzinane, Arabic was added to the School’s Spanish, French, and Chinese modern languages, as well as Latin and Greek.
Benzinane, educated in Morocco, also teaches French classes and can teach Spanish, in addition to teaching his 10 enthusiastic Arabic students. Recently the class was featured in the Reading Eagle newspaper in an article by Paige Cooperstein: http://bit.ly/1nVAwTL.
As the students have astutely noted, the language is spoken so many places, and the study of the language is made even more valuable by learning about the social, economic, cultural, and religious contexts of those nations.
Benzinane had been working in a corporate position while teaching part-time. He earned a B.A. in English Literature with a linguistics minor from Hassan II University in Morocco in 1997. During his final two years of undergraduate school, Yassine gained teaching experience as an E.S.L. instructor at the Hay Hassani Community Center. After graduating from Hassan II University, Yassine moved to the United States to attend Clark University, where he earned a Certificate in Web Design in 2000.
Since his arrival in the United States, Benzinane has balanced working in the corporate world while remaining active in the classroom. Most recently, he was an international bibliographer for New Hampshire-based YBP Barker & Taylor Library Services, a role that required him to travel to the Middle East and Asia. His teaching experience includes multiple levels of French and Arabic at the Minuteman Vocational High School in Lexington, Mass. from 2001-03; The Peace Academy in Lake Mary, Fla. from 2005-2011; the Inlingua Language Centers in Lake Mary from 2008-11; and most recently at the ISGM Cultural Center in Manchester, NH.
Benzinane also coaches JV boys’ soccer and thirds boys’ tennis at The Hill School.
