The 2025 IATEFL International Conference and Exhibition took place in Scotland’s capital city last week.
The 2025 IATEFL International Conference and Exhibition was held from Tuesday 8 April to Friday 11 April 2025, with pre-conference events taking place on Monday 7 April at the Edinburgh International Conference Centre.
Attended by several thousand people from over 100 countries including teachers, trainers, managers, freelancers, lecturers, materials writers, publishers, examiners, trainees, researchers, ministries of education, universities, teacher training colleges, national teaching associations and many more, the event was once again a resounding success.
One delegate, who was attending the event for the first time since 2009, told EL Gazette: “IATEFL has really stood up to its promise of supporting English language teachers and researchers. I have attended other international conferences, but this is much closer to what we expect. I think it’s quite unique.”
An EFL teacher from Brazil who attends every year, told us. “We get so excited about being here. The conference programme particularly resonated with my experience in Brazil, where educational realities differ considerably. It underscored the vital importance of contextualisation, with a key message being the need to thoughtfully adapt ideas to one’s unique teaching environment.
“Initially, there was worry and frustration regarding AI, particularly in low-resource contexts. However, the current approach at the conference seems to be more human-centred, acknowledging the potential of AI while emphasising human factors.”
The IATEFL Conference is a four day celebration of the English language teaching profession with over 500 academic sessions, an exhibition of all that’s new in the world of English language teaching, and a busy social programme of fun evening events and opportunities to network and be part of the global community of ELT professionals. The academic programme includes headline plenaries, presentations, workshops, panel discussions, lightening talks and poster presentations.
A FULL review of the event will be featured in the upcoming May issue of EL Gazette. What were YOUR key takeaways? Share your thoughts by emailing us at editor@elgazette.com or by joining us on LinkedIn.*
*Please note: Comments will not be included in our review article without your explicit permission.
