Ashleigh Sayer learns through travel, witnessing things ‘people do every day in different parts of the world’
Though Ashleigh Sayer is now the ELL department head at ARHS, she started teaching in 2007 and began teaching ELL classes in Amherst in 2016. In addition to running the programs for English language learners at ARHS, she supports students both academically and socially, setting them up for success in their day-to-day lives and the future. Sayer’s mission as an educator is to help students find something that interests them and to help them learn to love learning about it. She also works hard to help students build connections and relationships with one another.
Right now, Sayer is teaching a Composition and Literature class to intermediate-level English learners and a Communication class for students just beginning to understand English. Mainly they practice speaking, listening, and hearing their voices in English. A typical day for Sayer includes teaching; supporting students with a variety of projects and ideas; catching up on missing work; creating lessons; assessing student progress; meeting with colleagues about curriculum; and conducting assessments for new English learners in the district. Currently, Sayer is also trying to organize ACCESS testing, an annual exam administered to English learners in grades K-12 in many US states.
Sayer believes in “the power of social capital,” defining it as “networks of relationships” that help further our personal and professional growth. “I started noticing when I was in high school how important it was to have a diversity of relationships in my life and not just relationships with people who were exactly like me,” she said. As a teacher, Ms. Sayer has seen her students work hard to get where they are, but often in a small bubble where they don’t meet many people outside their daily routines. Sayer wanted to be able to start helping them build relationships with students all over the school.
One way that Sayer feeds her own desire to constantly learn and grow in her own life is by exposing herself to new points of view through travel and getting to know people and places that can teach her new things. Sayer has gone to more than 50 different countries. Several of those countries she has visited multiple times. She traveled internationally 10 separate times in 2024 and 7 separate times in 2023. She’s not sure what 2025 will look like yet.
Sayer grew up reading National Geographic and was fascinated by the people, landscapes, and cultures depicted in the articles. “I also had the opportunity as a child to meet people from different parts of the world, and learn about their lives and interests,” said Sayer. “I wanted to visit their countries for myself and experience what it felt like to be an outsider or a newcomer. I wanted to turn the tables on myself.”
Travel has taught Sayer many things: how to plan and budget, how to read a map, and navigate her way through new places, how to read people, how to learn to trust herself and others, and how to be okay with making mistakes and getting out of her comfort zone. During her time as a runner on her high school cross-country team, she learned this was called “getting comfortable being uncomfortable.”
Sayer has never really had a broad travel goal; she wanted to see new places and witness things that people do every day in different parts of the world. “I gravitate towards mountains and places that present a physical challenge, but I have been fortunate enough to see a broad range of places, from deserts and mountains to rainforests and cities to farms and teeny tiny villages,” said Sayer. “One of my loose goals has always been to visit every country from which I’ve taught students.” She has achieved maybe a third of this goal. Sayer has been teaching for a long time and has had students from so many different parts of the world that this will be a lofty goal to achieve.
When Sayer travels, she feels many emotions: excitement, fear, happiness, loneliness, and everything in between! She has felt all emotions depending on the type of trip, whether or not she was alone, and what she planned to do while there. “I’ve felt anxious, stressed, isolated, awkward, and a bunch of other negative feelings.” In addition to the excitement and energy of being in a new place, Sayer feels immense gratitude when she travels through a breathtaking landscape or meets kind and wonderful people.
Traveling to another country is certainly not always an easy thing, especially the way Ms. Sayer travels. Some aspects of travel she dislikes include jetlag, stomach problems, being stared at or catcalled, and sometimes intense homesickness. During travel to another country on a remote island, Sayer was the only white person on the island; people on the island had never seen a person who looked like her and not being able to blend in was exhausting. She was being stared at, catcalled, and offered multiple marriage proposals. She connected some of this experience with her students who first came to the US and potentially felt stressed or overwhelmed and she always tries to remember what it feels like to be the odd one out in a group of people.
As for advice, Sayer says to remember to take care of yourself while traveling. In India, when her stomach sickness was getting worse she ignored it, and it got worse and worse to the point she nearly died of dehydration. Luckily, there was a hospital nearby and she was admitted overnight with a fluid IV.
Sayer is always excited about the novelty of a place and the challenge of trying to navigate it, literally and figuratively. She is passionate about the opportunities to see the very best parts of humanity when she needs help or support somewhere far from home and a complete stranger comes to her aid without asking for anything in return. The anticipation of a new day, experiencing a variety of landscapes, using or trying to use a new language, and finding commonalities with people from cultures really different from her own is always a joy. Few things in life compare to that feeling.
Sayer has not had a favorite place and feels this is very hard to pick!! Everywhere has something memorable or unique that she has taken with her and attempted to share “when I talk about or reflect on the experience.“ Sayer has a special place in her heart for Colombia as a whole; she also loved Guatemala, Brazil, Cabo Verde, and Rwanda. Sayer lived in Denmark, Indonesia, and Pakistan so those places also are full of every type of feeling for her. In the future, she hopes to visit Vietnam, Vanuatu, Cuba, Cameroon, and São Tomé.
When Sayer travels, she prefers to do so alone most of the time. She has traveled with friends and significant others and family and even colleagues; there are good things about all of these options, she said. But usually, she prefers the solitude of traveling on her own. “I have some little nuances that make it hard to be with me for 24 hours a day, trust me,” said Sayer.
Sayer decided to be an ELL teacher because she loves meeting people from different parts of the world and she knew ELL teaching would give her regular opportunities to make those cultural and linguistic exchanges that she loves. When she started studying language, literacy, and culture in graduate school, “I had no idea that I would become a teacher. I thought I was going to become a journalist.” said Sayer. However, she enjoyed explaining things in creative ways and being around young people, so Sayer decided to give teaching a try and taught adults in a center for Somali refugees. She loved the challenge of it.
Sayer wants her students or staff to know that she guesses it’s worth repeating to anyone wondering whether it’s possible to travel while working full time as a teacher…the answer is YES it is if you want it enough!
“I am not wealthy in the financial sense of the word and I have worked for nearly every dollar I’ve ever had to my name. I deliberately choose to spend my money on travel experiences in lieu of other things, like visits to the salon, new clothes, a fancy house or car, and lots of dining out,” said Sayer.
In addition, Sayer recognized her privilege as an American-born person to educated parents who ensured she had a passport so that she could begin traveling once she had saved her money. The American passport, while not the most powerful in the world, affords an array of visa-free travel options that many people do not have the luck or good fortune to possess. And Sayer says she never takes that privilege for granted.
