Essig spent the last 30 years of her career as a professor at Vancouver Community College. She is warmly remembered for her extraordinary commitment to students, as well as her unique pronunciation classes.

These classes were designed to improve English pronunciation in her students, primarily recent immigrants and international students. The innovative teaching techniques and practice materials which Ms. Essig herself created and then further developed over the course of her career, resulted in great and incessant demand for the seats in her classes. Her dedication to pronunciation instruction is demonstrated in her generous donation to TWU’s TESOL program.

“Acquiring these books and recordings from the Essig estate is a substantial and invaluable addition to our collection,” says Bill Acton, PhD, director of the MA TESOL program. “Many of the texts are now out of print, yet most of Ms. Essig’s collection is in near perfect condition. Thanks to these resources we will now have most of the published, seminal works on second language instruction.”

"Our vision," continues Acton, "is to continue widening our resource base for both teachers in training and researchers, making it one of the best collections of its kind in North America."

To download the complete list of books, click here.

For those who were unable to attend the reception in honour of Janet Essig on April 21, 2006 at Trinity Western University, the audio from this event was recorded and is available on our streaming server. The recording is approximately 1 hour 5 minutes and includes contributions from William Acton, Norma Boutillier, Jan Porcino, Pat Wakefield, Nancy Chu, Sandi McIntosh-Kocaba and Nina Kozakiewicz (in order of speakers).