My Journey

November 2009 – 1.4.2017 ( Part One)

My last eight  years in the education sector was not spent in one school but in fact in many schools. I left school in 2009 to join the Institute Aminuddin Baki, the Ministry of Education training wing  for heads of schools . 

 

When I made the move in 2009, I brought with me 25 years of classroom teaching . During  the last  14 years of my 25 years at school,  I was a subject teacher as well as an administrator ( Senior Assistant in Student Affairs and Senior Assistant in Administration and Academics ).I missed out on the top post , that is the Principal of the school. I was at the saturation point. I was ready for new challenges, new working environment. No regrets.

Since April 1981, I have served at 5 schools in total . I took a short break of unpaid leave from November 1986 to April 1990. In 1995, while serving at the fourth school. I was appointed as the Senior Assistant of the Student Affairs, an administrative post .In December 2002 I was appointed as the Senior Assistant in Administration and  Academics at my fifth and final  school. In November 2009, I moved to my final post as a senior lecturer at the Institut Aminuddin Baki before retiring in April 2017. 

 

I reported for duty on September  2009, about 1 month after the letter of appointment  to the post of Senior lecturer was sent to the state education department. It was  dated 1.8.2009. I wonder why the delay in delivery. My gut feeling told me to make an enquiry at the state department. Eventually it came after a month later . I received the letter of appointment on the 10^th of September 2009 and as soon as I received it, I immediately drove up the Genting Highlands to report for duty

There was a big number of new intakes for this post ( about 200 )  at different grade levels and seniority. The most junior post was DG44 , the most senior was DG52. I think there were about 10 us seniors in the DG52 post category. I think the big numbers of us who reported for duty was quite overwhelming for the old staff. The term tsunami was often heard mentioned amongst them. 

 

Before this influx of new lectures , there were about 50 teaching staff. 

 

With the main focus of the Ministry of Education to increase quality training to all schools heads  and to increase the knowledge and skills capacity in the present and future heads of school, the increase number  was justifiable.  And of course there were many of us seniors who came in on grade post higher than the present staff. And of course words were circulating that we came merely for the post  because we were offered a grade higher in salary and seniority. We were perceived as very inexperience in the field of training. So how can we be given the trust to this job well. My colleague even overheard one of the administrators talking out loud that we ‘don’t know anything’ . oh well, we were not in the capacity to rebuke that statement. Of course we lacked experience in training but the majority of us who were from schools were mostly ex assistant heads .We may lack the experience in training but trust us, we had years of running the school . What we lacked we compensated by the knowledge and skills and the right frame of mind.