OUR STORY

In 2004, I, Olga Smith, was looking for an elocution tutor. My American husband could not understand some of the words I was saying. People often asked me to repeat what I said. Then I was saying it in the same way; it was a vicious circle. I felt my foreign accent was a nuisance for me and others.

After a long, difficult search and failed attempts with numerous "elocution tutors”, I found Linda James, a qualified phonetician with 20+ years of teaching speech in London drama schools and accent reduction to international professionals. From the very first lesson, I fell in love with Linda's teaching method and could see the progress straight away.

In 2006, I told Linda I wanted to write a book based on her method and asked her to co-author it. I wanted to make Linda's exclusive and very enjoyable lessons available to a wide audience. This is how the international bestselling book Get Rid of Your Accent, Part One was born.

Linda and I later co-authored Parts Two - Advanced Level and Three - for Business, and our most recent book is Get Rid of Your Accent for Beginners.

Meet the authors, Linda and Olga

What teachers say about our books:

"Clearly, the authors of the book have collected years of experience and expertise to create this practical and effective tool for speech study."  

Joe Windley

Head of Speech, Central School of Speech and Drama, London

What students say about our lessons:

“I had the privilege to take a number of private lessons with Olga. I reached out to Olga after I came across one of her amazing books. In a nutshell, she is amazing and very effective. First of all, I learnt a lot about my speech and accent after a careful assessment that Olga administered.  Then, we worked on every issue in detail. Olga provides easy to follow explanations and also makes sure to let me speak a lot and then comment and correct. Just several lessons led to very substantial improvements. I recommend Olga to anybody who would like to master their English pronunciation, accent, and articulation without any reservations.”
Ilya Stibulaev, PhD, Stanford University, USA.


“ As a diplomat, I need effective communication skills, particularly to address public audiences through radio and TV. A clear, crisp accent is always more convincing than a thick, foreign one. I am reading Get Rid of Your Accent book, and I think it is immensely useful for foreigners like myself.”
Samuel Moncada, Venezuelan Ambassador to the UK


“I am a native English speaker. But I decided to take elocution lessons in order to soften my Australian accent (and a nasal drawl that came with it) and acquire Received Pronunciation (RP). But elocution, as I knew, is not just about accent. I also wanted to generally maximise the power and expressiveness of my voice and to achieve my full potential in public speaking. This is particularly important to me because I am a barrister and so my voice is one of my main tools of trade.

I began with the excellent books and apps in the ‘Get Rid of Your Accent’ series. I then decided to take my voice training to the next level and seek out one-to-one tuition. Since I was so impressed by the approach in ‘Get Rid of Your Accent’, it made sense get in contact with one of the co-authors, Olga Smith, who, I saw, was also in the business of giving personal lessons.

Since taking up lessons with Olga Smith, it is no exaggeration to say that the change in my voice has been dramatic. I have now not only mastered all the sounds of RP, but eliminated bad (or at least suboptimal) habits in my speech, and my voice is more powerful, authoritative, expressive and interesting. There are huge benefits to one-to-one tuition and professional feedback on the idiosyncrasies of one’s voice that it affords. But beyond this, Olga’s particular approach and method is excellent and unique, for the following reasons.

  • First, the standard she sets is high. She uses traditional teaching methods employed to teach RP and speech in the top English drama schools to training actors (resulting in the rich voices and polished accents of top British actors, both past and present). I have researched other elocution providers and the conventional modern approach seems to be to water-down these high standards (perhaps driven by fashionable ideas that too high standards offend against egalitarian ideals). It seems that Olga’s traditional methods of elocution teaching are very difficult if not impossible to find elsewhere (at least outside drama schools).

  • ·Secondly, she really knows what she is talking about. She is very perceptive to the nuances of speech when giving feedback, and very knowledgeable about the techniques to make the voice powerful and expressive, and about methods for learning and acquiring new habits.

  • ·Thirdly, lessons with Olga are always enjoyable, with fun (and often funny) speaking exercises.  She has a warm and engaging personality which creates a real rapport between teacher and student.

I unreservedly recommend Olga as a teacher for anyone who is serious about improving their speech and achieving high standards with it.”
Oxford Graduate Barrister from London, the UK

Accent rReduction Workshop in the Russian Embassy, in London

Accent Reduction Workshop in the Russian Embassy in London conducted by Olga Smith

Ambassador of the Russian Federation to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, residence
"I was very surprised to attend so interesting a class - which, as I’ve noticed, everybody enjoyed. I’ve spoken to my colleagues and all of them have found it very productive. As I previously learned French phonetics, I can say that your method is very useful, because you start from the base matters (how to move the tongue in the right way). From my point, of view it is quite difficult to learn any matter, and especially phonetics, without attending classes. Because the teacher gives much more than a book. And your proved it 100%. Thank you once again for your course!"
Stanislav Suprunenko

Head of the Ambassador’s Office, Russian Federation

BaTCS GLOBAL ESTABLISHED IN LONDON IN 2006

OUR AREAS OF EXPERTISE:

OUR PRODUCTS:

OUR SERVICES:

  • Individual speech analysis

  • Online and in-person elocution lessons/courses in London

  • Workshops for corporations & banks

  • Workshops for teachers & students in EFL colleges

Our Team

Linda James (RAM, Dip. Ed., IPD, LRAM)
A trained phonetician and actress with over 25 years of experience teaching RP and accent reduction to international professionals. She brings her proven method and expertise to the apps, books, and video courses in the Get Rid of Your Accent series


Olga Smith (BA Linguistics, MBA)
Linguist, public speaker, and co-author of the best-selling “Get Rid of Your Accent” series. Having overcome her own accent, Olga brings practical expertise to learners worldwide


Yury Kravchenko (PhD in Physical Sciences), software developer with 20+ years of experience. All our books have been converted into iOS and Android apps by developer Yury. Yury himself had a strong Russian accent, and his elocution tutor recommended our Get Rid of Your Accent book. He enjoyed the book and the progress he was making with it. Yury proposed turning the entire series into apps. Thanks to Yury, we published 9 iOS Apps & 9 Google Play Apps based on our books.