Teachers

Who are our teachers? Do we know them very well beyond the school compound or they’re just our teachers? How much respect do we accord to our teachers?
Teachers are human too. A God’s being who were brought up in this world to teach. They come in many form and disguise.
Some are regulars teachers serving primary and secondary schools. Some serves in the university and some teach in dilapidated wooden house in ‘sekolah pondok’. There are many who also teaches in university.
Things are not easy clamed some teachers. They’re the educator and they’re also the disciplinarian. They carry more roles than our parents and spend more time with us but yet they’re also first to be blame for their student’s failure.
Are they well paid to handle all this stressful situation? As far as I can remember we students have never been good to them. Stealing, skipping school, extortion, vandalism etc. You name it, we’ve done that. So back to the question, “Are they well paid?”
Are they well respected? My late grandfather always said that teachers are always prim and proper and they usually attract a lot of attention from ‘future parents in law’, pretty young ladies, and also children who would like to be like them. Those days teachers are well respected individuals. Every mom and dad wanted their children to be teachers and many wanted to marry off their daughters to teachers.
Kampung folks seek their opinion on almost anything. Children would carry their bag at school. Whenever there’s confrontation, they’ll be the first to be call upon to settle it.
But how is the situation today? Teacher is considered a last resort career. Many will only choose teacher-ship when they don’t have much choice. When all attempts have been exhausted, then they’ll turn to teaching profession.
We do get some bad apples among teachers too. But fortunately this numbers are kept low. Like any other profession, you do get trouble makers who’ll tarnish the image of this teaching profession.
Other than parents, teachers are our point of reference whenever we need some answers. What the government needs to do is to further enhance the benefits and remuneration package for teachers.
I hope the teachers today will take this profession seriously. They might not been paid as highly as their counterparts abroad but they do know for a fact that whenever they see a successful story, they know that other than parents, teachers contribute a lot to that success story.