“Sometimes, it’s not even about English”: native speakers help Ukrainians learn English

What is the problem?

English has always been one of the most popular languages for learning in Ukraine — hundreds of language schools, online courses, and tutors available on the market made learning the language a relatively easy, although not that affordable, task. However, according to the face-to-face survey conducted by the Razumkov Center, 43.8% of Ukrainians do not know English at all, and only 1.1% are fluent in it. At the same time, 19.2% can read, write, or speak English a little. Ukrainians have had multiple opportunities to learn the language, but, as in many other countries, learning a foreign language isn't always a priority. 

Many Ukrainians got by with a small vocabulary, as they mostly used English for traveling or rare conversations with foreigners. Everything changed on February 24, 2022, when Russia launched its full-scale invasion. Millions of Ukrainians found themselves fleeing abroad in search of safety from Russian shelling and missiles or after losing their homes. As of February 2024, around six million Ukrainian refugees were registered across Europe and 6.5 million worldwide. For most of them, learning English has become a matter of survival and for some — a chance to speak loudly about Russia's atrocities and proudly about being Ukrainian.

What is the solution?

Balakun is a non-profit organization with mentors all over the world and the management team based in New Zealand, USA, Ukraine, Norway, Mexico and France. Balakun is Ukrainian for "Chatterbox," representing the essence of the initiative – to foster meaningful conversations and build connections. Sandi Dempsey, the project initiator from New Zealand, shared with Rubryka how she came up with the idea and how it works in practice. 

When Russia launched its full-scale invasion, Sandi was looking for information on the hot topic and got really frustrated and angry with the posts of the Russian Embassy in New Zealand. She was set off by how the information was processed and how misleading information was being spread online. She tried to understand the position of Russians, so she attempted a conversation on the topic in one of the Russian Facebook groups, but she wasn't even allowed to post a message. So she found a different group — a Ukrainian one. That's how it all started. There, Sandi found out how Ukrainians were helping each other in the gravest times — food prepping and knitting socks for the Armed Forces of Ukraine, sorting humanitarian aid, and keeping themselves busy when everything seemed lost. That's when Sandi decided instead of being angry and arguing with Russians online, she could do something useful to help Ukraine, so she spent the next week collecting socks. 

Quite a few people had recently moved to New Zealand from Ukraine at the time, and once, one of them posted about looking for an English teacher. Sandi is not a professional teacher, but she offered her help with conversation practice. Her first "student" had rather good grammar and vocabulary but lacked speaking practice, which, as it turned out later, was a common case among many Ukrainians. Sandi decided to expand her "class" and offered her help to some other Ukrainians she met online. She ended up with five or six students with whom she held Zoom chats. Most of the students didn't even want to have traditional lessons, rather simply wanted to chat in English.  

After some time, the number of students grew and when she already had around 20 people in her "class," Sandi understood that it was time to call for help, as she also had a full-time job and only 24 hours in a day. 

"Then I thought, I'm not doing anything special, I don't have any special skills. I'm just a native speaker, and there are lots and lots of native speakers who want to support Ukraine and do something helpful," Sandi shared with Rubryka.

She posted her idea on Twitter, looking for volunteers. Her tweet got picked up by someone with a huge number of followers who were pro-Ukrainian, so Sandi got overloaded with messages from people offering their services. Since September 2023, when it all began, the initiative has developed a small team of people who manage different areas of the organization, and then many volunteers or mentors who they match with students. As of now, there are 516 matches — 516 pairs of people working together, from 39 different countries on every continent except Antarctica. About 80% of the students currently live in Ukraine.

How does it work?

Anyone who can speak English fluently can become a Balakun mentor, as long as you can commit to at least one 40 to 60-minute session per week. The registration process is quite easy — you simply should fill the questionnaire and wait for the team to contact you. After a one-on-one call, where your fluency, Internet connection and motivation are verified, you will be matched with a student. The matching process is carried out by Tetiana Spindel, one of Balakun's co-founders, which makes it very personalized, as she gets to know the mentors and potential students before making a match. However, if either a mentor or a student feels uncomfortable or unsatisfied with the choice, they may contact Balakun and request a different match. As the number of people in the Balakun family is growing, they are considering some more efficient and automated options for matching, or maybe even involving some sort of algorithms. 

The process is quite similar for the students. For now, the preference is given to those Ukrainians, residing in Ukraine, with military and volunteers being prioritized. However, if you are a Ukrainian living abroad, this doesn't mean you can't become a part of the Balakun community. It only means that if there are more students than mentors, the prioritized categories would be matched first. As for Ukrainians living abroad, Sandi explains that they are probably exposed to more English than those in Ukraine, so it should be a little easier for them to learn the language in the first place. 

According to the project's founder, Balakun can be found at almost any existing social media platform, where they are building a strong and supportive English-speaking community. For example, on their Discord channel, they offer speaking clubs on various topics, as well as group lessons. That way, students are not limited to their one-on-one lessons with mentors, but can develop a whole English-speaking environment around them. 

The classes are usually held via any suitable free platforms — Zoom, Google Meets or Skype. However, after the mentor and student feel comfortable with each other, they may choose any form of communication — be it e-mails, phone calls, or voice messages in any messenger. 

Balakun YouTube channel also fosters two-way information flow — Ukrainian volunteers share with the world the country's history, artistic visions, and other subjects, and supporters of Ukraine are invited to do likewise. 

Does it really work?

The project's founder shares that Ukrainians come to Balakun for various reasons — some want to work for international companies and need English for career growth, others want to express themselves freely online and cut through the disinformation wildly being spread by Russia. 

"For some Ukrainians, these classes are a simple break from the realities and horrors of war. Sometimes, it's not about learning English in the first place, but about speaking to someone outside of Ukraine," Sandi shared with Rubryka. 

This is especially true for those serving in the ranks of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, most of whom simply want to distract themselves from what they see and endure on the battlefield. 

"We don't consider other Ukrainians' wish to learn English less important than that of service members. However, their need to get a mental break from active duty and just having someone cheering them up on the other side is more urgent," Sandi believes.

She shares her experience of mentoring an officer, who expected their lessons to be military themed, but, in fact, their conversations were mostly about mundane things — music, daily activities and hobbies. 

"Once, he recorded a voice message for me in English, without even recognizing he was speaking English. He was surprised and excited he could do that after a month of our classes. His joy and success is what makes me want to keep going. I feel we do make a difference and help people in so many ways, not only language-wise," the initiative's founder proudly says. 

Another massive part of it is allowing people in Ukraine to communicate with people outside of Ukraine, to tell them what's going on in Ukraine, to share what's happening in the lives of Ukrainians, and to battle all the disinformation and propaganda spread by Russia. "A lot of people outside Ukraine get their news from sources that are very biased or very deliberately misinforming," Sandi is convinced. It also brings what's happening in Ukraine closer to home if you know somebody who is there. It's much harder to watch the news indifferently when you have a friend in the city affected by a missile attack. "It's a very different feeling, and I found that out straight away," Sandi continues. "People need to get information from inside Ukraine, not from outside. So that was a really big motivator as well."

Janice Seto, one of Balakun's mentors residing in Canada, shares that after the invasion of Ukraine in 2022, many of her proactive friends wanted to help Ukrainians in their towns and cities. They also looked online. She found Balakun a very supportive organization. For over six months in 2023, she hosted weekly classes on Zoom with the goal of boosting people's comfort in speaking in English. "I find Balakun has a big-tent vision — a forum for both Ukrainians and Ukrainian culture and its supporters. In order for these goals to be realized, it has to be sustainable — and I feel the organization is finding this in social media and communications technology," Seto shares.

The number of success stories is constantly growing, and so is the number of Ukrainians who feel more confident in their language skills. Oleksandr, one of Balakun's students and an active service member of Ukraine's army, shares that his journey with Balakun started thanks to a tweet. At that time, he had already been learning English with a tutor via Zoom for a year. Oleksandr lives in Odesa, one of Ukraine's biggest logistics centers, so he is sure that speaking English will open some opportunities for him in the future. However, he also emphasizes that Balakun, for him, is not only an investment in future career growth. It is also a chance to meet new people for an engaging, useful, and fun time and definitely a distraction from Ukraine's current war reality with a hope for a better future.

"The relations with my mentor are somewhat therapeutic. Of course, our first meeting was shy and awkward, but since then, we have become good friends," Oleksandr reminisces. Despite time differences and busy schedules, the student and his mentor often get lost in conversation and speak longer than the designated one-hour lesson. Fun fact — Oleksandr's mentor has already visited Ukraine twice with volunteering activities. During his second trip, he traveled to Odesa, got to meet Oleksandr and his family, and even learned how to cook varenyky by following instructions from Oleksandr's wife. They visited the Odesa theatre together and went sightseeing, learning more about Ukraine's cultural and architectural masterpieces. Oleksandr got to act as an interpreter for his mentor, making things come full circle.

Even more useful solutions!

Balakun has a simple algorithm for anyone willing to join the initiative — both for students and mentors. 

• To become a mentor, complete the mentor sign up form and wait for the managers to get in touch with you using the email you provide on the form. After a short online "verification" call with you to check your internet connection, fluency and motivation for joining, you will be matched with a student and invited to the initiative's telegram channel. 
• The process is similar for potential students — just fill in the student sign up form on the website.

If you have any other skills and want to help Balakun differently, you can reach the team on any of their social media channels in the link tree or via e-mail.  

Balakun is run by volunteers, but they do have some operational costs such as servers, software licenses and teaching materials. If you like to support the initiative financially, you can donate on buymeacoffee or using PayPal (info@balakun.co). Financial reports will be released annually and are available on request.