About Me: Derek Philip-Xu

I have always enjoyed writing. It feels natural to set up Refreshing Copy to help people and businesses with their writing, be that for content creation, copywriting, web content optimisation or developing educational materials. And here's why:

I spent almost 10 years teaching English to speakers of other languages, a big part of which was showing people how to be better writers. After all, writing is such an essential part of communication.
Following on from English teaching, I moved into educational publishing where, as an editor, I mentored authors and helped develop effective digital English language learning materials. I did this for EF Education First in Shanghai and then Macmillan Education Ltd (part of the Springer Nature group) in London.
As an editor, the language learning materials I produce have to be understood by people of any level of English language ability. So, instructions and text have to be clear and concise - just like in copywriting.
My publishing experience has also provided me with a great deal of editorial project management experience - working to tight deadlines and to budget.
I am a published writer. I wrote an academic paper that was published in the International Journal of Bilingual and Multilingual Teachers of English. You are more than welcome to read it on the University of Bahrain's Scientific Journals website.
I blog about ELT, publishing, education and other topics. My LinkedIn article about Gatekeeping in ELT Publishing was well received and shared widely, most recently by the Raise Up for ELT team.
I have a master's degree in applied linguistics from The Open University (handy for education) and another master's degree in research from the University of Exeter (very handy for copywriting). Both were completed by distance learning while working full time so that taught me the importance of time management and disciplined studying while still trying to have a life.
Finally, I qualified as a professional member of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors in 1997 and worked as a commercial practice surveyor (property and facilities management) for eight years.

My career started in the UK before taking me to Japan, Spain, China and then back to the UK. So, I have picked up some Japanese, Spanish and Chinese along the way!

For more detailed information about my experience, you can check out my CV.

Please do get in touch and we can have a chat about how I can best help you and your business.

Thanks

Derek

Derek was prompt and detailed in his work. As a new business owner, how I come across to my audience is vital and he gave me the edge I needed to ensure my voice came across well. So easy to work with as well!
Jane Berwick, The Adult Learning Hub

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