Our trainers:
Ms Melinda Hull is an American teacher who has been teaching English in Japan since 1985.
For the last ten years, Ms Hull has specialized in teaching scientific English and medical English in universities in Japan, including the University of Tokyo and Tokyo Medical University. Drawing on her years of experience teaching English to future researchers, her expertise in translating and editing, and her proficiency in the Japanese language, she has developed a unique understanding of the problems in the writing of Japanese researchers. She has used this in-depth awareness to create a highly effective curriculum for teaching research writing to Japanese researchers. Ms Hull is also passionate about using technology for teaching, and she is currently working on a number of e-books on how to write research papers.
As an Instructor of Research Writing in Cactus Communications, Ms Hull conducts workshops for our clients in Japan and assists in developing our online courses.
Academic background: Ms Hull received a BA from New York State University, where she studied linguistics. She was awarded a Smithsonian Fellowship to study in Egypt and Israel. A keen student of languages, she studied Arabic in the American University in Cairo and completed a concentration course in Japanese in the Academy of Language Arts in Tokyo.
Mr. John D. McDonald
Mr. John D. McDonald is a Canadian instructor who has been teaching in Korea since 1996. Since moving to the Gwangju Institute of Science and Technology in 2004, Mr. McDonald has specialized in teaching writing and editing research papers, across a diverse range of disciplines, to both Korean and International researchers. By drawing on his years of experience as the Sr. English Lecturer and Coordinator of the GIST Writing Center, and extensive editing experience, he has developed a unique understanding of the problems many academics face when writing in English. He then uses this in-depth awareness to pinpoint common problem areas and provide a clear, concise, introduction to the challenge of writing an academic research paper. As an Instructor of Research Writing at Cactus Communications, Mr. McDonald conducts workshops for our clients in Korea.