In a world where teachers often don’t show up because of low pay, listen to what our teachers have to say:
Vanna Lida:
I am 27-year-old female teacher. I have been teaching at this school for 8 years, first and second grade. I am married with a new born baby girl. I live about 10 minutes from school. Since school started a month ago, I notice that there are quite a few changes. Students are behaving better because of strict rule: coming to class on time, dressing properly, picking up the garbage and keeping the restroom clean. The whole school has a new look with nicer landscaping and some flowers around it. We don’t have much garbage polluting like it used to be.
Teachers and students have better understanding of school’s policy and our common goal, which is earning good education. This is very helpful because it is much easier to talk to each other. Students do not miss class a lot like last year. But, the challenge is to wait until it is the busy season when their parents need help with rice field work. I hope that students continue to come to school on a regular basis throughout the school year. Having water available in both of the restrooms is very helpful. The restroom is much cleaner now, and it is nice to have soap in each restroom. I want to thanks Kari and her entire team who has been so supportive since the beginning. It is wonderful to have good and reliable representative like you who can assist us and share with us new ideas.
Seang Vannich:
I am a 24-year-old female teacher who has been teaching here for 3 years. I am single and living in one of the teacher residents here at school. Our school is much cleaner this year. I enjoy teaching more because most of the students behave better toward teachers in general. They seem happy to be here at school and want to learn. Since you are here, teachers and students alike are being on time to start and end the classes. I think this year we have a better relationship with our students, which makes our job more pleasant.
I am very pleased that teachers have our own restroom to use, and it is very convenient. I want to personally thank you for being here and all of your hard work. It is nice that you share with us how to handle students and point out our weakness and strength so we can try to improve our performance. I also want to tank Kari for everything that she does for us: teachers, students and the whole Chrauk Tiek community. We can never thank her enough for what she does.
Ngeng Sophea:
I am a 25-year-old male teacher. I have been teaching here for 2 years. I teach third and fourth graders. I live here in the teacher residence. Since you have been here, there is new spirit among us, especially the teachers. In many ways, our school is in a much better shape whether the garbage, the water supply, the restroom hygienic, new accessories in the restroom such as brushes, broom, soap, water containers etc… I especially enjoy having our own brand new restroom. I plan to make a fish pond after the national holiday, Bon Omtouk, and hopefully it will work well. I hope the fish will help us financially because food is expensive here. It is nice of you to give us some vegetable seeds so we can grow a few different kinds of vegetable.
I feel that this is a nice school and there are some benefits that we receive like additional salary, free housing, brand new restroom, solar power and water supply. Other schools in the area don’t have what we have. I have friends who are teachers in near by school. They told me that they wish their school would be as nice as ours. I want to especially thank Kari for her continuing support and all the hard work that she does. Without her, our lives would be much more miserable as you already know that the salary from the government alone is not very much to live on. We are grateful for everyone who gets involved to help us out.
Chim Vichet:
I am a 23-year-old, male teacher. I am single. I teach here for 2 years. This year I teach fifth and six graders. This year, our school improves a lot, from the garbage to the restroom hygienic, to water supply. Students and teachers seem to have new attitude for the better. Our school is almost garbage free and the students’ awareness of their responsibility is amazing since you have been here. It is great that you give us good example by picking up the garbage like you do every day. The children now understand how we all could play a role to keep our school clean, especially when they see you do it instead of telling them what to do. I feel that you are a role model to all of us. I can see now that students’ attendance is very good. I have to admit that this is the first time in my life that I have a nice restroom to use, which is wonderful. I hope that you will be able to stay here for a long time so our school will continue to grow and improve. I am not sure what my future would be like, but I hope that I could do better financially and perhaps have a family in the future. I am not sure how long it will take me to reach that point. Like everything else, to get married, it costs money, and I have a hard time saving for it because of my low salary. We are all in the same boat; we’re struggled everyday to meet ends need. Despite all the down side, we realize how fortunate we are. We do better than most teachers because of Kari’s help. I want to let her know that we appreciate her very much for supporting us all these years.
