A journey in teaching and art

In celebration of her recent accomplishment, we caught up with Ilina who shared reflections on her time at Lucy Cavendish, her passion for teaching, and the importance of lifelong learning.

"My name is Ilina Kachinske. I come from North Macedonia where I graduated from the state University of Ss. Cyril and Methodius, majoring in English Language and Literature (Faculty of Philology). In 2008 I was honoured to receive the prestigious Chevening scholarship to pursue my MPhil studies in Applied Linguistics at the University of Cambridge and become part of the Lucy Cavendish community. It would be an understatement if I said that the time spent in Cambridge was a fairytale. A rather laborious but nevertheless still a fairytale.  I was part of several volunteer groups: The Betty Stubben’s Musical Entertainment Group as part of the Student Community Action group and The Umbrella Autism Group where I worked with autistic children at the Sunshine Club. In my free time I roamed the historical streets of Cambridge and London and took every opportunity to freeze in time moments that captured my eye. One of those shots was the winning photograph. Cambridge was also the year in my life that most of the existential questions popped in my head. One of them was connected with my choice of science over art. By the time the master studies ended, the answer was also crystalized in my mind that art is not a profession per se, but a way of life and as such it will always be part of me. 

Since I graduated from Cambridge I came back to Macedonia and worked at the state University for a year teaching English. During my studies in Cambridge I read a paper by Robert DeKeyser and I had a very strong feeling that I want to pursue my doctorate with him and only him as my mentor. That’s what happened. During the interview one of the professors was astounded that I had not applied anywhere else and that I did not have a plan B. I was once again honoured to be accepted at the University of Maryland to pursue my PhD in second Language Acquisition under the mentorship of Robert DeKeyser. As life happens, during the first day of the orientation for new graduate students I also met my future husband, Adam Kachinske, with whom we have five children. After 8 years in the States, we decided to move back to North Macedonia and raise our children here. I have been working as an Assistant Professor at the University American College Skopje teaching linguistic-related subjects. I have also continued writing and taking photographs.

I  do have a shy personality when it comes to my achievements. I usually don’t want to bother other people with my art or with the things I have accomplished. As I said previously, ever since I know about myself I have been immersed in some kind of art. Actually, even the profession I chose, which is teaching, is nothing but art. For me it is the ultimate form of art – to know the learners, their cognitive, social, emotional characteristics and to be able to tailor the material specifically for them. The questions that have guided my teaching philosophy have been: how do people gain knowledge and how do people achieve long-term retention of knowledge? Having these two questions in mind has enabled me to run the extra mile and think of creative and efficient ways of guiding students to arrive at the right realisations. So the way artists resort to alternative methods of communication, teachers should also strive to abandon the old traditional ways of depositing declarative knowledge in students (banking system of education, Freire, 1980), and discover ways to co-construct the knowledge together with the students. I decided to enter the competition because my soul and computer were bursting with things I have been creating. They were ready to start their own lives. The winning photo has always been one of my favourites. It was taken on a day outing to London. I remember being mesmerised by the spontaneity of people and their habits of enjoying the parks. Parks in Macedonia at that time were full of people as well, but it was very strange to see people sitting down on the grass, sitting next to strangers on a bench, or even being alone. Looking at the people in London, especially in the parks, gave me a magnificent feeling of being liberated. Wow, I thought. One can do these things without thinking what other people will say, because people here don’t really mind. God forbid you go out with wet hair even on a summer day in Macedonia. Every second person you meet on the streets would scold you for going out with wet hair on the pretext of the possibility of catching a coldJ. England made me fall in love with the rain. I only had a year there, how could I just stay home when it was raining, when my time was limited and there were so many places to visit and so many lesser known streets to roam. The photograph was the epitome of the new ways I discovered in England: cultural diversity not on paper but in practice, liberation of the spirit, giving to the community for the sake of giving not for any personal gains, reading in public alone next to two other strangers, respect for the individual choices people make and embracing any situation the way it comes."