The context in which this happened was our Teacher Development Course which we ran in Cambodia earlier in June this year. Why did we run it in Cambodia? It was because Cambodia is one of our offshore bases for service-learning, where we have multiple projects conducted by different teams from different departments, mostly in summer. Hence we can schedule the Teacher Development Course to coincide with some of the projects over there. This way, we can arrange for the teachers attending the course to visit the projects, observe the students delivering their service, speak with the teaches as well as our local NGO partners, and gain first hand experience.
Sister D is one of the teacher attendees from India. We also have teachers coming from Philippines, Vietnam. The rest of the teachers came from two universities in Hong Kong (including our own). Many more teachers wanted to join, but encountered difficulties with timing, finances, … We are now trying to secure some funding so that more teachers, particularly those from developing countries, can join us.
Most of the attendees are teachers, with a few administrators. The were very attentive, and the classes were interactive. There were numerous questions, on the conceptual framework, practicalities of the projects, how to find partners, how to design projects for specific disciplines, how to assess student performance, etc. All the discussions culminate in their major assignment - to develop a proposal for a subject (course) or project. We study, discuss, eat, travel, and live together for a week. There was a genuine sense of camaraderie and I made a lot of new friends personally. The whole thing made an enjoyable and rewarding experience and none of this would have happened without service-learning.
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