The Jungle Teacher

This week, I was a privileged 1 of 13 selected education grad students, from Berkeley, Columbia, Harvard, Penn, & Stanford, to attend a mini conference organised by the Progressive Education Institute (PEI) of Harlem Village Academies (HVA). We had the opportunity to visit 3 HVA charter schools, & hear from their teachers & academic directors: HVA East Elementary, HVA West Elementary, & HVA West Middle. Here's what I learned.

First, let me wish every Malaysian teacher reading this a Happy Teacher's Day!

This Teacher's Day, I was featured in NST print (I haven't read it yet because I have yet to receive a high resolution photograph of the article. Please help me out!) as well as NST Online. It is indeed a huge honour to represent the teachers in Malaysia and more specifically my beloved colleagues working at rural/remote schools.

Let me clarify that I am NOT the only teacher working in the hinterlands of our country, neither am I the most hardworking or the most deserving of "special" mention. There are plenty who are labouring endlessly for the betterment of the communities they are serving. Unlike syok-sendiri me, thousands serve wholeheartedly without seeking reward or recognition. To these teachers, I salute & I bow in respect.

Nonetheless, I did have a purpose for sharing my story. This part of my interview wasn't published. So, you're getting the deleted scenes strai…

In March, I presented a poster based on a paper I wrote for one of my courses at TC. The title of the poster was "Recommendations for the Language Vitality of a Native Language in Malaysia". Those of you who are familiar with my teaching background would be able to guess that I was looking into the ethnolinguistic situation of the Iban language.

Why conduct the study?