PROF. WALDIR CURY (Rio de Janeiro - Brazil)

e-mail: professorwaldir@taquigrafia.emfoco.nom.br

Shorthand Website: http://www.taquigrafiaemfoco.com

On-line Shorthand Course: http://www.taquigrafiaemfoco.com/curso_de_taquigrafia_online_em_word.htm

A retired parliamentary reporter and a teacher of shorthand.

My first contact with shorthand happened when I was a young – 18 years old. It was love at first glance. My sister, who studied at a catholic school of Spanish nuns, learnt shorthand, probably the Martí System. I gazed in admiration at her Diary written in shorthand and said to myself: “One day, I will learn those scribbles.” So, I did it. Just for fun! I had never imagined that one day I would be a parliamentary reporter.

The day came. A public contest for choosing 15 stenographers for the Rio de Janeiro Legislative Assembly. There were more than 1600 candidates. I won in the first place among the 15 stenographers qualified for the job. My learning “just for fun” took me there.

Some time later, I applied for being a shorthand teacher – a title granted by the Education Ministry. I did well on my two exams: the History of Shorthand and the giving a shorthand class in front of the Board of Examination.

After 35 years working as a parliamentary reporter in Rio de Janeiro Legislative Assembly – a job that I always did with great satisfaction, I am now enjoying my well-deserved retirement. But, in spite of being a retired man, I am very busy not only doing things that I really like, such as, reading books, playing classical guitar, surfing on the Internet, but also teaching shorthand privately and on-line, my great passion.

Yes, I am a private shorthand teacher and have a shorthand Website (with more than 20.000 visits a month), which contains a free online shorthand course. The online shorthand course is a big success and is counting now with a significant average of 10 new enrollments a day. The tendency, as I can foresee, is an increase of this average, as more and more people have computer.

When I talk about my on-line shorthand course, I always repeat what for me is a certainty: the future of shorthand (I am talking about the graphic shorthand, my great passion) is on the Internet. It is a curious paradox that exactly the “technology” that was supposed to wipe out the graphic shorthand, can be its principal ally to estimulate a widely revival of shorthand and to help and support the diffusion and the teaching of shorthand all over the world. I have no doubt about that! That is why I would like to take this opportunity and encourage every teacher of shorthand to go ahead and launch on-line shorthand courses.

We should not forget that on-line courses (E-learning) have no boundaries and can reach the most distant places and houses – through the Internet. Of course I am talking about a modern course of shorthand, that uses a special methodology, that makes use of videos, of interesting drills with answers, tests with answers, all means of teaching that make learning more agreable, more attractive, more exciting.

Besides Portuguese (my mother tongue), I know English, French, Spanish, Italian, German, a little Russian and a little Arabic. I can speak fluently English and French. I can read well in English, French, Spanish, Italian and German. I studied only two years of Russian and Arabic.

In Brazil, we use mostly the graphic shorthand. Very few institutions make use of Stenotipy. According to the Researches made in 2000 and 2003, there are 24 shorthand systems still in use in Brazil. The most used is the Leite Alves System, a system taught at Taquibras (the most important shorthand course in Brasilia, directed by Prof. Paulo Xavier).