Young Professionals Inject New Energy Into Schools
From offices to classrooms, Kelvin, Natalie, and Tracy (Fellows 18-19) left their career to join Teach For Hong Kong. While they all worked in different industries, what united them was their commitment to grassroots students and eagerness to inject their new energy into schools.
One of the young professionals, Natalie, quit her job in construction to join Teach For Hong Kong
Taking gap year is popular nowadays, and many use it to leave their bubble and rediscover their career direction.
Three young adults in their 20s decided to leave their full-time positions and stable incomes to join Teach for Hong Kong. They step into grassroots primary and secondary school for a year, using their previous work experiences and networks to inject new elements into these schools.
Learning Not Just To Get 5**
The three Fellows have each worked for two to four years. They decided to quit their jobs last summer and step into grassroots schools. In addition to teaching, they also took time to prepare activities and guide students’ career development. Their past experiences and networks brought new energy to grassroots schools.
Kelvin (left), Natalie (center) and Tracy (right) all worked for two to four years before joining Teach For Hong Kong
Kelvin was previously an engineer before he stepped into the secondary school. To help his students make career plans, he invited his brother, who works at the Human Resources department of Apple, to share tips on how to job search.
He proudly said: “Even the school was surprised and asked me how I made it happen”
He realized that students only cared about homework and exams. They lack opportunities to cooperate with each other. Therefore, he led a group of students last semester to join “Schools of the Future” competition organized by the Hong Kong Institute of Engineers to create opportunities for students to work together outside of academics.
Kelvin took his students to hardware stores to purchase equipments for the competition
Students were responsible for all parts of the competition, from dividing up work to coordinating meetings. This competition not only helps develop much-needed workplace skills for his students but also inspired them to learn proactively.
In order to emulate the real world of business, Kelvin asked his students to write their competition proposal in English. He said that it was necessary for students to understand why they need to learn so that they would do it willingly and wholeheartedly, not just to "get 5** to enter university". Seeing that his students would rather write an extensive English proposal than do their English homework made Kelvin not know whether to cry or to laugh.
“While my students reversed roles, chasing me to correct their grammar,” Kelvin joked. In the end, students won the Silver Award and the Most Innovative Award.
Bringing your “work” to school
Natalie was originally a geologist. You could usually find her dealing with workers at construction sites in her previous work. She came up with a way to bridge the construction and education worlds together.
Natalie put down her construction helmet and picked up her chalk to lead a class of primary school students
“Some parents of my grassroots students work in construction. But they seldom share their work with my students,” Natalie pointed out. So she invited her former colleagues to share their work. They even brought helmets and work clothes for Natalie’s students to try on.
Grassroots parents were often busy working to make ends meet, hence the only parenting they could do was to let their children play on mobile phones and tablets. However, the parents were often unaware of the problem of cybersecurity. Therefore, she co-organized a course on cybersecurity with another Teach for Hong Kong Fellow to teach their students about cyber traps.
After classes, she would take time out of her personal schedule search up videos online and translate, voice-over, and edit to make fun of teaching materials. When her students shouted “It’s Ms. Cheung’s voice!” while watching her videos, all her hard work was worth it.
Hearing students yell “Ms. Cheung!” makes it all worth the time
Natalie is among the 30 graduates who graduate from Geology of the University of Hong Kong every year. Most of her peers are professionals hired straight out of school. Hence many could not understand why she quit her stable job to become a Fellow. She often responded with humor, “Stones never talks to you!”
Natalie smiles when she remembers how her students call her name every time she passes through
While she needs to get up at 5:30 am every morning and commute from Tung Chung to her school in Diamond Hill, it was all worth it when her students would run to her to share the "big news" that their parents took them to eat buffet, or hearing deafening voices of students shouting “Ms. Cheung” when she passed the corridor.
She summed up with a smile, "This is the happiness they give you, and it makes all the extra time worth it.”
This article is originally published in the Hong Kong Economic Times. The excerpt above is an English abstract of the original Chinese article. Please click here for the original article.