I've been stuck in long interminable meetings over the past few months ... so many of them .... which makes me wonder. Do long meetings really achieve their objectives? Plus, I get awfully hungry when I sit down for long hours. Which doesn't exactly help my diet plans. Hmm, what diet plan, anyway? Since I joined the district education office, diets and exercise plans seem to have disappeared from my life.
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Today a friend asked me for some advice. Should he go to the PPD (education district office) or stay in school? Well, it all really depends. I know why he asks me for advice. I am currently working in the Kota Kinabalu PPD and I have past experience working in the State Education Department. I've also racked up a reasonable number of years in school, if you'd call 11 years reasonable. Here's what I want to say to him and I'll make it clear that this is my OPINION. How many years has one been in school? Two years? Six years? I'd want to have at least three years of school service time under my belt before I try the challenging walk of a PPD officer. Some people would scoff at that and say more years are required. However, if a teacher has been in school almost seven years, I'd advise him to stay put. He has better promotional chances in school. HOWEVER, there are many reasons for one to serve as a PPD officer (note...
Sigh, it's that time again.... of choices, dilemmas, adjustments and ANGST. Yesterday was a deadline for the Form Six Academic Teacher Post applicants to verify their data with the Unit Naik Pangkat (Promotions Unit?) of the Sabah Edu Dept. As I have already moved to the District Education Office, I had to contact my previous school to do the verification. The teachers were whispering about a possible appointment briefing in March or April. Hmmm, wonder what that would mean for me. A Senior Assistant friend of mine sat for an hour, unloading all her grief related to this promotional exercise. There were teachers who applied for posts in Phase One but didn't get any offer, while others who applied in Phase Two were given offers. So the aggrieved teachers were complaining to her, asking why how who what and whyyyyy ...( imagine sad eyes and upset hearts ). I think (my own personal opinion, okay??) that this may have happened because a number of teachers in Phase One turned ...
The first time news came of promotional posts for Form Six teachers was in December 2007. That excited so many people... and then news came again of Master Teacher posts up for the taking. In Sabah, anyway. Promotional exercises came fast and furious and forms were being filled in by every teacher. There were even cases of teachers filling in forms because they saw their friends filling in forms and they were afraid of being left behind. I remember when I was a DG44 Senior Assistant ( Penolong Kanan ) in school and there was an opportunity to get a DG48 post as a Form Six Academic Teacher. I waffled for two weeks and finally gave in to the fear of being left behind and FILLED IN THE FORM! Like so many other of my compatriots. And the result is... so many of my Senior Assistant friends are now stepping out of their administrative posts and taking up DG48 posts as Master Teachers or Form Six Academic Teachers. Some are happy as they have been buckling under the stresses of a...
My head is aching and my eyes are red.... I've been downloading excel files from my inbox for the past three days and copying the data from each file into a master file. And in the midst of all the data crunching, I get my patience tested. Test One Mr X : Hello, this is Mr X from School PQR. Actually what is it that you want? Me : May I know who attended the briefing two weeks ago? Mr X : I did. But I'm not sure what you want. Me : (pauses to find a chair to sit down and takes a deep breath). Okay, Mr X, do you have the CD? Mr X : Have to open the CD ah? Can't you just tell me....? Me : Okay, when you open the CD, you'll find four folders. Click open Folder entitled Program MNO, then click open Folder entitled... Mr X : Wait wait... let me find a computer. Wait ah... you don't mind, do you? Me : No............................................. I don't mind. Test Two Me : Hello, Mr W. I am Pn. Roslyn from XXX. I received the CD from your school but th...
First, a little background info for my friends not in the service. In December 2007, we attended a briefing where we were asked to nominate teachers for DG44, DG48 and DG52 posts as Form Six teachers in school. As my school had four Form Six classes, we had one DG52 post, three DG48 and five DG44 form six academic teachers posts. These teachers were not going to do any admin. We also had one DG44 Form Six Senior Assistant post and one DG44 Form Six Cocurriculum Coordinator. This was a great thing for teachers in school...at last they had another avenue for promotions, other than going into administration (as a principal, senior assistant or dept heads) or becoming GCs (master teachers). Of course they had to teach Form Six students, which isn't exactly a walk in the park. However, the people in the briefing room weren't exactly happy. And I knew why. Blow Number One was that the senior assistants in school (myself included) were to remain in the DG44 grade. I could fores...
Doing admin at my place of work has made me realise how important people and their relationships with each other are in making sure the organisation functions well. I also see that there is no such thing as black and white, as in Mrs A is wrong and Mr B is right. Usually the conflict will have its roots in something else and most often, it's a 'minor' thing. But like a burr under a saddle or the pea in the princess' bed (remember the fairytale?), the 'minor' thing festers and festers and in the end, something blows up. So as an administrator, to ignore 'minor' things and to discount people's opinions and WORSE..to take sides, would be the beginning of major troubles in the organisation. For example, one of my friends' troubles began when she asked a very very simple question: Are you divorced? But the one who was asked that question took such violent offense that ever since that 'minor' question, she took every opportunity to undermin...
It's Wednesday and we're in the third day of the PMR exam. Left school at 4 pm just now and saw the PMR Exam Secretary sitting on a bench at the school door all alone. She looked limp. But still able to muster a smile... So I had to say,"Hey Jen, still alive? Ha ha..." She smiled........well, what else can you do when your mad PK says something like that. Especially after a memorable first day. Monday I roamed the Form Four classrooms, growling and threatening infanticide to anyone who dares to sing and shout out loud when the PMR exam is going on in the next block. Things didn't improve when three classes of Form Four entered their temporary classes and found out the fans were not working. So we had to do a quick reshuffle of classes. While the Form Four coordinator handled that, I walked over to where the Form Threes were assembled. I boomed out,"Dah periksa dokumen? Semua bawa kad pengenalan dan slip peperiksaan?" (Have you checked your docum...
Been 'lost in PTK space' for the past three weeks... why oh why did I register myself for a repeat of the PTK? Must be those dollar signs in my eyes :) Yesterday one teacher hesitantly asked me about the Form Six promotions. Immune to all the questions, and also rushing to a PPSMI meeting and lugging my unfinished PTK essay under my arm, I just said,"Don't worry don't worry...the dept will organise it." Today, TWO approached me at different times. The first wanted to know when I would organise the next filling-in-forms session. Blur me just said...wait wait... The second teacher was more specific. He said,"Have you checked the MOE website in the last two days? The letter and forms are THERE." A light switched on in my head. I put the PTK essay, exam timetables, PMR madness etc etc... ALL OF IT aside... and checked the website. Since my last visit 2.5 days ago, there was one crucial update. IT'S TIME FOR FORM SIX TEACHERS' PROMOTION OP...
It's almost the middle of April and I'm huffing and puffing and trying not to get my 'house' blown down... School tests just over and we're gearing up for first term exams. I find myself sitting at my table looking helplessly at exam analyses piled 6 cms thick and the discipline master's just sent me an sms telling me some interesting things about the creativity of kids in my school. Yeah, and also in the other millions of schools all over the world... It's also time for school debates, choral speaking contests, forum remaja etc etc ad-absolutely-nauseam. I'm also the absolutely insensitive administrator pushing painful stuff like debate competitions at my English teachers. Not only do I make them sit with kids and teach 'em how to debate ... I also hound them to take part in TEACHER debate competitions. Yup, I'm absolutely mean. But don't get me started about debates. I can go on and on about how good debates are at helping people build up...
It's the end of the school year and I'm looking at two checklists. Work Checklist 1. Takwim Sekolah 2008 (almost done!) 2. Laporan Tahunan 2007 (to be put together) 3. Fail Rekod Mengajar 2008 4. Office clearing up (this should be high up the list!) Personal Checklist 1. House cleaning 2. Christmas card-writing (which I almost always end up not sending) 3. Christmas gift-buying, wrapping and tagging And the final most special list: Self-Indulgent Checklist 1. Having breakfast at 9 a.m. and thinking of what I'd been doing in November all those years in SPA :) 2. Having tea at 3 p.m. with old friends and catching up on the latest developments :)) 3. Putting up the Christmas tree and not having to think of JKKN, ICT meetings and courses :))) 4. Calling up teacher friends so we can trade stories on who's doing what end of the year...:))))) After one year in school, I've come to this conclusion: I suffer more stress at school (because of the myriad jobs to be ...
One of the things that really irritate me is people making snap judgments about my friendliness and my work ethic. They see me as friendly and quickly make the assumption that it means I'm going to cut them a lot of slack at work. HELLO! Anybody home in that empty vessel you use to carry your hair??! Now I'm beginning to understand why a lot of the administrators in school feel that they have to be serious and grumpy. There are LOTS of people out there who feel that if there's a chance to slack, they have to grab the opportunity with both hands. I'm still undecided about whether or not I need to be a grump (snapping left and right) to be an effective administrator. My dad (who retired as Chief Inspector of schools) thinks I don't need to go around scolding people to get things done. And I agree. All I should need to be is be a serious and straightforward administrator. But I do agree that some people don't UNDERSTAND things unless it's said to them in...
The 2008 School Calendar is now available at http://www.moe.gov.my/tayang.php?laman=kalendar_sekolah&unit=utama&info=&bhs=my&mod= Thanks to Ho from PPK for this info.
Good news for those in search of Fail Meja Ketua Panitia and Manual Prosedur Kerja. It's now available in ebook form at gurubashid.com . Guru Bashid himself said that he is not creating new material but just repackaging information that is freely available. But you know the 'sakit jiwa' of retyping documents, right? I just made payment via Maybank2u.com and am now waiting for the download link. Hope this is legit but I think it is because Guru Bashid has a blog online ( gurubashid.com/blog ) and when I browsed through it, he looks authentic. And he's worked in SM Sains Sabah before! So is anyone going to retype the old pekelilings and the garispanduans and sell them as ebooks? Opportunity is knocking...:) I know someone who compiled all the SPs and HSPs into a CD complete with index. But I don't know what he's going to do with it...
I'm sitting at my office desk right now. In front of me is a Form 5 student taking her English test (she was absent during the test last week). Under my table is a pile of papers to be marked. Let me list them out: English Form 5 Paper 1 - two essays per student English Form 5 Paper 2 MUET Listening answer sheets - MCQ, thanks to the guys at MPM! MUET Reading answer sheets - MCQ as well (and my partner marked them for me! Thanks bunches, Florence!) MUET Writing answers - summary & directed writing..grooooaaann.. Not so many to do, right? But BEHIND ME sits fearsome documents - school's strategic plan drafts and school's headcount data. Okay, I'm going now. The slave's gotta get back to work. BETH, DON'T YOU MISS ALL THIS WORK?????????
I've been a school administrator for 6 months now and I'm discovering things. I like teaching young people. I like bringing these young people into a computer lab and seeing their eyes light up. Even if it's so clearly a rare event in their lives. (Hmm, the administrator in me is scribbling notes.) I like showing them stuff like how to throw their voice and hearing an improvement in some kids' presentations. I like sitting in school resource centres. I like debates, dramas, aerobics before class, march pasts..etc. I like the Friday potluck brunches in the teachers' staffroom. I like looking at what a school has and doesn't have and figuring out how to make things better. I like the hurly-burly of life in school. I don't like meetings (if they come at least twice a week and it's been thrice the past few weeks). I don't like scolding people. Adults or youngsters. I prefer the buddy-buddy approach but sometimes instant action is required. I don'...
Every year, people ask me this question. EVERY YEAR. I think,"Should I scream?" No lah. You ICT-savvy people, please print out the URL and put it up on school noticeboards. And forward the info to all your friends. Punca Maklumat Untuk Pentadbir, Guru dan Pelajar http://www.moe.gov.my/bpk/