Swapping city comfort for village experience

T^he Star Online
http://thestar.com.my/

By RICHARD LIM

SWAPPING the comfort of city homes for the simple life of village folk can be quite a challenge and different — especially if you come from an affluent family.

However, this is precisely what 60 Fairview International School students will do when they go to Siem Reap, Cambodia in July.

Some of the jubilant students after receiving their scrolls at the graduation ceremony

“This trip will equip them (the students) with first-hand experience of how Cambodian life is like,” said Fairview chairman Daniel Chian (pic) at Fairview’s graduation ceremony at the KL Hilton.

“Being middle schoolers aged nine to 12 in our International Baccalaureate (IB) programme, they should be able to reflect upon their experience that this is the human ingenuity component of the IB syllabus in action.

“Cambodia is not limited to tourist haunts like Angkor Wat and they will come to terms with the true situation when they observe the poverty in many areas of the country.”

Adding that there was no room for elitism in the IB programme, Chian revealed that the students would also compile a 12-chapter book based on their experience.

The book would then be circulated to more than 3,000 IB students around the world.

According to Chian, such an effort has never been done before in the IB circles and the students would have the unique opportunity to be co-authors. The school is also set to spend up to RM14mil in its teacher training scholarship programme.

Launched to spearhead different styles of teacher training, the programme will see up to 18 lucky SPM and STPM school leavers being trained at Roehampton University — a renowned teacher training institution.

“The successful candidates will receive full scholarships for their foundation degrees,” continues Chian.

“They will equip themselves with practical teaching skills in their second year and the experience will be invaluable. They will also receive stipends.”

On the ceremony, Chian said he was proud to witness the first of many graduations as far as the class of 2009 was concerned.

By being the first batch to complete the IGCSE ‘O’ level examination at the school, the 67 graduands were also offered the chance to study ‘A’ levels at Fairview.