By Sarah Dodoo | Higher Education Program Associate
"If we believe that tomorrow will be better, we can bear any hardship today"
Thich Nhat Hanh (Global Spiritual Leader & Peace Activist)
Dear Friends,
We hope that our latest update on our Community Service Internship Program (CSIP) finds you and your loved ones doing well. In the midst of all the uncertainties and despair posed by the ongoing global health crisis, we hope you are somehow taking one day at a time and forging forward.
Here at BEAM, thanks to your continued support, we continue to make progress and impact the lives of our students. The COVID19 pandemic has presented us with our share of challenges but we are glad for the opportunity to share updates from three of our students with you in this report. We hope you are encouraged by their determination, service, and appreciation for your support.
With joy,
Sarah.
Thel Thel, a 4th-year student at the Chiang Mai University studying Social Science:
How do you feel about this past semester? Were your classes challenging? Easy?
This past semester was a bit easier than the previous semester and most of the classes were not challenging because I had already taken some difficult courses in the first semester of the third year. In the past semester, I took 6 courses and only one course called Technoscience and Modern Society was a bit difficult for me. However, I did my best and I am satisfied with the grade.
How did you do on your final exams?
Since I had to take 6 courses in the past semester, I had to manage my time well in order to study every single subject regularly every day. Actually, due to the Covid-19 pandemic, all courses were take-home exams, so I got more time to prepare myself for final exams. I searched and collected information for writing research and essays before the exam day.
Have you participated in any school events/additional community service recently?
I have participated in one event called the International Street Fair Day. In the event, I participated by selling Burmese foods (Tealeaf Salad, Shan noodle, and Mote Hin Khar). I enjoyed the event a lot because many different nationalities tried the food that I and my friends made, and they really liked our food. And another thing I did was teaching Burmese to Shan children every weekend in View 17 (Shan Camp). However, due to Covid-19, I had to take a break from teaching. But now I am doing a small project with my friends which is about waste management and renewable energy at Chiang Mai University (CMU). I have been doing this project since the beginning of this semester and it will be completed in October. The purpose of doing this project is that I and my friends want to raise awareness about trash separation and how these different kinds of waste can generate renewable energy. And also, we want students to manage their own waste (not throwing unsystematically) and to benefit the CMU community. CMU has a biomass management center and it creates renewable energy from the waste to be used again in the university as well as using this renewable energy to generate some of the electricity within the center. Therefore, we are doing this project because we want the students, staff, and visitors to know that this center exists to manage waste.
Did you enjoy your internship? What were your responsibilities? What did you learn?
Teaching is my joy and I enjoyed my internship with the children. Children are innocent and they are very active learners. Even though they do not know how to write the Burmese alphabet and speak, they never stopped learning. I really love to be with them and I hope to see them again when things get better. My responsibilities were teaching Burmese to children from 5 to 10 years old. The children are of different ages, but I chose to teach younger children basic Burmese. Children above 10 years were taught by my friends. What I have learned from this internship is that I love sharing what I have and know. These children allowed me to contribute my knowledge to what they know and I do not want to stop contributing my knowledge and skills. With any small contribution, I hope that we can change something and become a strong community.
What did you find most challenging at your internship?
The most challenging is that the location is very far away from where I live. It takes about 40 minutes to reach the internship site and the children are free only at night. So, it is usually very late by the time I go back home after teaching. Everything is okay for me apart from the teaching location.
How was your summer break?
My summer break was over without going back home to Myanmar and doing my internship fully because of COVID19. In the coming semester, I have to do an internship for four months. I am now thinking to do my internship at MAP Foundation, but I am not sure yet whether the foundation has called for internships or not. If they do not, I have a backup plan to work back in Myanmar.
What suggestions do you have for the CSIP committee or your internship? How can we improve?
I have no special suggestions for the CSIP committee, but I would like to say thank you for supporting me until my final year. Without CSIP, I would not be here today. I really appreciate your great support.
Chen, a 4th-year student majoring in English at the Chiang Mai Rajabhat University:
How do you feel about this past semester? Were your classes challenging? Easy?
I feel that this past semester was not really comfortable for study because all the classes were managed as online classes. It was quite complicated and there were many problems regarding online studying. We often faced bad internet connection during a lecture being given by a teacher. The worst thing was when the students turned in the assignments or homework, and the teacher lost them. This problem happened to me about four times. These were the challenging things I experienced. I felt that the efficiency of the study apparently decreased.
How did you do on your final exams?
I did well on my final exams. Even though the results of some subjects were quite unsatisfactory as I expected them to be, I think I did my best. There were two subjects that I obtained unsatisfactory results in; English for Business and English Poetry Selection. There were no final exams arranged by the teachers for these two subjects. Teachers were assigned to write essays and all the exercises in the textbooks were submitted. The teachers then gave grades for these.
Have you participated in any school events/additional community service recently?
Yes, I have. Currently, I have joined the Shan Youth Power (SYP) organization. I volunteer and teach Shan and English. In addition, I volunteer to teach English and Burmese languages at Wat Sai Moon.
Did you enjoy your internship? What were your responsibilities? What did you learn?
Yes, I really enjoyed my internship. My main responsibility was teaching. Asides from that I had to do a lesson plan and attend teachers' meetings. Working with Shan Youth Power organization as a volunteer I learned about classroom management, teaching skills, and social participation.
What did you find most challenging at your internship?
The most challenging thing that I found at my internship was persuading students to come to the class. The children regularly go to school during the day and they have to come to the extra classes in the evenings. Sometimes they felt tired and they did not really want to attend the extra classes. Therefore, I had to find many ways to persuade them and make them interested in my lessons such as playing fun games that relate to the lessons. It worked.
What suggestions do you have for the CSIP committee or your internship? How can we improve?
I do not have any suggestions by now because I see that the CSIP committee runs an amazing project already.
Aung, a 2nd-year student at the Chiang Mai University studying Social Science:
How do you feel about this past semester? Were your classes challenging? Easy?
The past semester was a bit easier than the present. It was not pressuring for me. I got a chance to be the class coordinator this past semester and as the class coordinator, I was assigned programs, events, and activities; performed a variety of specialized duties to coordinate and support the day to day activities of class and maintain collaborative relationships with the different departments and lecturers.
How did you do on your final exams or upcoming exams?
There is a mid-term exam upcoming mid-September for the first semester of second-year students. For this first semester, I have taken 5 subjects which are major courses; contemporary theories, religions and social change, the introduction of economics, critical writing, and effective reading, and transnationalism course. There will be2 on-site exams and for the remaining 3 courses, they will be term papers. Everything is tight for this semester because not only do I have classes to study for, but there are projects to do in the community as well. Time management is the most important thing to handle my classwork and community services.
Have you participated in any school events/additional community service recently?
Recently, I participated and led activities in two different communities, the Samsai migrant construction Camp and the Human Rights Development Center. The main aspects of our project were to create awareness on the dangers of COVID-19 and to learn about the ways to prevent it. The duration of the projects was 3 months.
Did you enjoy your internship? What were your responsibilities? What did you learn?
As the youth club leader and as an intern at BEAM, I helped to organize and contribute to the activities and workshops which we meant to promote solidarity and unity among migrant youth. The opportunity that I have gained helped me to learn things about good communication, good leadership skills on how to lead a team, accountability at work, as well as how to behave in public and the basic ethic to take duties and responsibilities.
What did you find most challenging at your internship?
The most challenging thing at my internship and during the community services were the languages. Most migrant workers I worked with are of the Shan ethnicity and other ethnicities from Myanmar. So, most of them did not speak Burmese. It was hard to communicate with them because of this.
What are your summer/break plans (classes, continue to intern, work)?
Currently, there is no plan for the upcoming break.
Links:
By Lulu Zhou | Higher Education Program Associate
By Lulu Zhou | Higher Education Program Associate
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