By Chhaiya Im | Founder and Headmaster
Dear Supporters, Teachers, Students, Parents and Family Members,
I am pleased to inform you that we are all in good health and spirit and we believe you are, too. We would like to take this opportunity to share with you the progress of our ODC students, teachers and community, and to express our deep gratitude for your continued support and generosity to help make the impossible, possible.
In our previous progress reports, we reported that the lives of Cambodian people have returned to normal without fear of the spread of Covid-19. However, life after the pandemic has posed other pressing issues. Many Cambodian people are in an even worse situation trying to survive as they fight against the high cost of living with rising inflation, unemployment and the global economic crisis, creating a nightmare in the country’s four main economic sectors.; real estate, garment industry, tourism and agriculture. We, the Cambodian people, have high hopes that the newly-elected government and prime minister who took his office on 22nd August, will take corrective actions to ease people’s current situations.
The resilience of our people is evident in the way normal folks make every effort to support their families. No matter what has happened nationwide, educational activities are normal; children go to school on a regular basis and our students come to ODC with readiness and enthusiasm to learn. With high expectations, teachers’ care and professionalism and parents’ cooperation, our students have achieved remarkable outcomes. ODC English lessons begin with students entering and standing to greet their teacher, followed by an hour-long lesson conducted entirely in English. It brings us a lot of pride and joy to see local children receiving a high quality of English education. The determination and commitment to improving themselves through education will eventually help to transform our nation.
Throughout the course of the year, a number of families have moved back to their provinces and so our present enrolment is at 181 students, with 43 on the waiting list. We hope to enroll more students in 2024, by opening up 2 more classes. Our teaching team comprises of 5 qualified teachers, 3 teacher scholars (one just joined the team on 19th October, 2023 and she is an outstanding student from our top class and dreams to become a teacher), a local volunteer and a headmaster, and together we are all committed to ensuring the best education at ODC. Our team shares a common goal of striving for excellence. With support and encouragement from the board, ODC teaching staff continue to attend teacher training session on a monthly basis and have brought essential teaching skills into their own classrooms. A couple of our teachers will sit for the International English Language Testing System (IELTS) exam at the end of this year. The other teachers will do so, sometime next year, after they have completed an intensive English course at Australian Centre For Education (ACE).
We are particularly proud of one of our teachers, Makara, who is in her final year at university studying TOEFL. Despite her busy schedule, she makes the time to attend monthly teacher training and weekly online lessons, all in the pursuit of excellence. As a consequence, her confidence has grown and she has blossomed into an amazing and effective teacher. Another of our teachers, Sophy, conducts an additional class on Sunday mornings to further support students who need additional help. Her passion and dedication are outstanding.
ODC is very pleased to announce that Katja, who I met while on holiday in Greece, is joining us as a volunteer. She will teach online remotely, once a week, starting in October. This means that more of our students will have the opportunity to learn with a native speaker. At present, we have a volunteer who conducts her lessons from Australia. This allows our students to vastly improve their skills in listening, speaking, writing and reading in English. ODC welcomes volunteers, either on-site or remotely and if you are interested, please contact me.
We have made physical improvements to our school buildings. We tore down an old wall and built a new one, built a concrete bench and also added a roof to create a dry space for students and parents to gather. Solar panels and lights were installed, providing greater safety at night. All these works were carried out by the Headmaster, so as to keep down cost. There are still a few more things we wish to do to make sure the campus is environmentally safe such as building a fence and raising the adjacent land, allowing us to have more play area for our students. With the high temperatures in the dry season, heatproofing the school roof is a priority. Sometime in the future, we would like to build a library, a listening center and a reception/staff room.
At the end of this year, on 7th and 8th December, we are holding a Parent-Teacher Meeting and celebrating an Award Presentation Day. Three of the Board members will be in attendance in Cambodia to share in our celebration of ODC’s achievements with the local team, parents and students. You are invited to come and say “Hello” to our kids and meet our team.
In closing, we would like to reiterate our whole-hearted gratitude for your on-going supportand generosity. It has been very clear that your commitment to ODC’s cause has been tremendously significant in keeping us moving forward in our endeavor to achieve the betterment of Cambodian society and in particular to open as many doors to opportunity as possible for our students.
Sincerely,
Chhaiya IM
Founder and Headmaster, ODC Organization
Project reports on GlobalGiving are posted directly to globalgiving.org by Project Leaders as they are completed, generally every 3-4 months. To protect the integrity of these documents, GlobalGiving does not alter them; therefore you may find some language or formatting issues.
If you donate to this project or have donated to this project, you can receive an email when this project posts a report. You can also subscribe for reports without donating.
Support this important cause by creating a personalized fundraising page.
Start a Fundraiser