Letter three

 

Dear Friends,

The 2009 TAB program commenced with 295 Cambodian teachers and directors as participants in 13 workshops with 18 Australian, 3 American and one English workshop leader.

His Excellency, Nath Bunroeum opened the program and talked about the last thirty years in Cambodian education since Victory Day January 7, 1979. He reminded us THAT AFTER THE FALL OF THE POL POT REGIME THERE WAS A BROKEN, EFFECTIVELY NON EXISTENT EDUCATION SYSTEM WITH FEW TEACHERS AND VERY FEW STUDENTS. AT THIS TIME ANYONE WHO WAS LITERATE WAS RECRUITED TO TEACH.

Today there are 3.6 million students and 165,000 teachers in Cambodian schools. He stressed how optimistic teachers should feel given the enormous growth in education. The current challenge is to improve the quality of teaching.

He set four clear goals for teachers and school directors:

• to improve student learning
• to develop child friendly schools that are clean, green and strict
• to improve the physical structure of schools and teaching materials, and
• to improve school attendance for everybody.

Our Leadership Program Workshop includes 27 directors/ school principals from schools with enrolments as large as 5210 students. Our role then is to work with them to unpack what they can do in leading their schools in achieving these goals. Our focus is to prepare them for what is possible in the next five years so that they start to think about a vision for the future - what schools and learning in Cambodia could look like. To this end they will be able to support teachers in developing a more student oriented approach as they move from rote teaching and learning to a focus that is sensitive to the Cambodian context and leads to improved student achievement.