Today, June 1, marks my 10th year in teaching at Ateneo de Naga University. Being hired ten years ago was more than having a job; it meant I can start believing in my self again after painful experiences in the seminary which ended up in my being separated (yes, expelled) from that institution. It is the Philosophy Department of ADNU who first believed in me again after being crushed. My then department chair, Sir Erick Lagdameo, who at present is again the head of the department, told me, if you want to be a successful teacher, love your students. Whatever that meant, I was not able to ask. After a decade, perhaps I know somethings about loving students. First, it is to always strive to be the best for my students. And being the best, I realized, is a horizon; it moves as you move. One is always just on-the-way-to-being-the-best. I am always as best as my last class. Second, it is to engage with the struggles of my students. A teacher does not always come to class having good mood, so do my students; I come to class with personal baggages, so too are my students. Third, to love students is fulfil a Johanine mission: to prepare the way for the students and to realize that time will come, that students will have to increase while I must decrease. To all who have been my students, and also for those students that have never been in my class but whom I have encountered as well, thank you so much. Of course, those three things are not always on my mind. In real life, I have to deal with my personal demons while in the classrooms, or while engaging with students. Loving my students can be taken by me to its very literal and romantic sense, sometimes. But within those 10years, I just hope I have given my best shot to love my students. Perhaps I truly did for it is by teaching that I have also found really good friends, even best friends that I shall keep for life. I also think about the students who may have hated me inside and outside the classroom, and maybe, to whom I also felt the same. I wish them well and for whatever reasons they have ill-feelings towards me, I ask for apologies. It has been a decade to thank for, to cherish and to push me for some more years in this profession. To the whole Ateneo de Naga UNiversity community, whom I have learned to love despite of its imperfections, thank you. Maybe, after another 10 years, I can again write about what does loving my students mean.
Posted on: Sun, 01 Jun 2014 06:09:31 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015