Teacher Development Course in Cambodia

We just concluded this year’s Teacher Development Course in Cambodia and returned home. For the teaching team and the majority of the participants (from 2 universities), home is Hong Kong. But some are returning to Philippines, Vietnam, and India.  This is one of the most international class so far.  

The class is held in Cambodia because during this time, several PolyU teams are doing their service projects there.  Hence we can arrange for the class to observe the students carrying out their projects.  These include a very professionally-run English workshop for primary school students, a team producing promotional videos for NGOs, a team teaching STEM programming, and a team doing public health checks for a group of elderlies at a community centre.  The class can observe which and how things are done well, and which ones need improvement.  

The class also met with the team teachers, who told the class how they design their subjects and projects, and how they train the students for the service. The class also met with the community partners.  Each of whom had very touching stories.  

And we got to use the very nice conference room of one of our partners the Sunwah Foundation in Cambodia, for one of the sessions.  

Most of the participants are teaching service-learning at universities.  Some are managing projects.  Some are administrators.  We ask them to each propose a subject or project, based on what we have discussed in class.  The days were quite full and tiring in the hot weather.  But all were in good spirits and participated actively.  There seems to be genuine camaraderie. People want to keep in touch and work together in some way.   In fact, some of them are already our partners and others may yet become one.  Evidently people are emotionally invested.  It is tiring but enjoyable teaching such a class.  

This is one way how service-learning differs from other academic disciplines.  When one attends a workshop or conference in a regular academic discipline, people connect on a professional level.  In fact, people are generally competing in being the first to solve a problem, create a new algorithm or theory.   In service-learning, there is a lot more mutual benefit if people do work together.  For example, students from one country A can serve in another country B with the help of a university in that country B, and vice versa, or students from A and B can go together to serve in a third country C.  The possibilities are many.   And the benefits are obvious and mutual.