Tag: NIE

30 Year Old Trainee Teacher, Yusrina Ya’akob, Is First Ever Female Malay Singaporean To Reach Everest’s Summit

Trainee teacher Yusrina Ya’akob has become the first Singaporean to summit Mount Everest this year after she reached the top of the world’s highest mountain on Monday (May 22), expedition company Everquest Expeditions confirmed.

The 30-year-old successfully climbed a dizzying height of 8,848m above sea level at 9.40am on Monday, after more than 50 days of trekking.

For Ms Yusrina, the feat is especially sweet after her failed attempt to summit Everest in 2015, which was meant to commemorate Singapore’s 50th year of independence. She was one of the leading members of the Aluminaid Team Singapura Everest 2015 which had to abandon the climb halfway following a powerful earthquake that struck Nepal.

For this year’s attempt, Ms Yusrina teamed up with Singaporean climbers Jeremy Tong and Dr Arjunan Saravana Pillai. The trio’s expedition is supported by Nanyang Technological University (NTU) and the National Institute of Education (NIE).

Mr Tong and Dr Saravana, who were both attempting to summit Everest for the first time, were unable to reach the top as they were both unwell.

Ms Yusrina started her summit push from Everest’s base camp last Thursday and reached the top one day ahead of schedule after taking advantage of good weather conditions.

Before her latest expedition, Ms Yusrina told Channel NewsAsia that she embarked on this second attempt because she wanted to “face the mountain again”.

“I would not have been able to get over it (the disappointment) if I did not try again … because the situation that forced us to abort our expedition was not because of a lack of ability but a natural disaster,” she added.

With her triumph, Ms Yusrina has become the first female Malay Singaporean to conquer Everest.

Editor’s note: The article originally stated that Ms Yusrina was the first Singaporean to summit Mount Everest since 2009. This was wrong. Pilot Felix Tan had conquered the mountain last May. We apologise for the error.

Source: www.channelnewsasia.com

May 24, 2017
Trio Bids To Be First Singapore Team To Scale Everest Since 2009

Three Singaporeans are set to embark on one of the world’s most perilous expeditions in a bid to become the first Singapore team to scale Mount Everest since 2009.

Dr Arjunan Saravana Pillai, Ms Nur Yusrina Ya’akob and Mr Jeremy Tong will depart Singapore for the Himalayas on Sunday (March 26) and will have up to early June to reach Everest’s summit.

The trio, whose expedition is being supported by Nanyang Technologyical University (NTU) and the National Institute of Education (NIE), have so far raised more than S$150,000 for their journey.

For Ms Yusrina, 30, the coming trip will assuage the disappointment of a failed attempt to climb Everest back in 2015, which was meant to commemorate Singapore’s Golden Jubilee.

The trainee teacher, who is pursuing a Postgraduate Diploma in Physical Education at NIE, was the co-leader of the Aluminaid Team Singapura Everest 2015 team who had to abandon their climb halfway after a powerful earthquake struck Nepal that year.

“Having made it more than halfway up the mountain two years ago, I was disappointed that the team had to abort the climb. But had we departed just one day earlier, we would have been in a much more dangerous situation higher up the mountains,” she said.

Her team members of the team are also experienced mountain climbers.

Dr Saravana, 47, a teaching fellow from NIE has more than a decade of climbing experience, have climbed several peaks, including the 6,400m Mount Kang Yatze II in India.

Mr Tong, 26, a graduate of NTU’s Sports Science and Management programme, became the first Singaporean to summit two Central Asian peaks above 7,000m last year — Lenin Peak in Kyrgyzstan (7,134m) and Peak Korzhenevskaya in Tajikistan (7,105m).

However, the team, who hopes their mission will help promote a resilient and can-do spirit among Singaporeans, acknowledged the huge challenge Everest will present.

“Beautiful as she is, Everest is also extremely unpredictable and volatile, which leaves climbers with a sense of humility and respect for the mountain,” said Dr Saravana.

The trio consulted other Singaporeans who climbed Everest in the past, including Mr David Lim, who led the first Singaporean expedition that summited Everest in May 1998, and the Singapore Women’s Everest team — who were the last Singapore team to successfully scale Everest back in 2009.

“We also trained for the past year, including two to three hour runs up Bukit Timah Hill and high-rise public housing blocks. We also do our own strength and fitness regimens, and rock climbing to improve our technical skills,” said Mr Tong.

Ms Yusrina, added that her past experience on Everest will help the team plan better. “It’s not so much the mountain that you conquer, but yourself,” she said.

Source: Today

March 23, 2017
Former Teacher And NIE Lecturer: Youths Must Still Be Encouraged To Do Embrace Knowledge

I am going to humbly go against the grain here and state that I don’t think sharing our past PSLE scores and telling kids what we are doing/where we are now is helpful. I think every kid’s performance in PSLE should only be compared to their own past performance or to targets they have set for themselves. I think sharing our PSLE scores forces a comparison between the kids and ourselves, which is terribly unfair because we did not go through the same education syllabus nor the same exams as they did. Our context and upbringing were different. Our circumstances will be different from theirs. Our measure of what success is will also be very different from one another. So why limit their possibilities by projecting ours?

I also find telling kids that PSLE scores don’t necessarily impact your future is misleading, because to an extent it does. Kids need to know that their actions (choosing to study/ not study) will have consequences (which school they go to/what courses they take) but what’s important is that they know we are here to help support them so together we can deal with situations where the consequences are not ideal. For the kids who may not have done well…hug them, kiss them, tell them it’s alright and you love them, and help them reflect on what is it that they thought went wrong. Empower them with skills and abilities they need to be autonomous learners who know their own strengths and weaknesses. For the kids who have done well, again, hug them, kiss them, tell them well done on their efforts and it is well deserved. And empower these kids too so that in case they find themselves facing failure in the future, they will be resilient.

My concern is that that in our attempt to convince some kids that “results don’t matter”, we belittle the efforts taken by other kids, educators and parents who believe in achieving academic excellence, with much grit and determination.

We have to tell our kids…YOU need to study. You need to learn and love learning. Be disciplined. Continue to put in the effort. Don’t use examples of people who have made it without doing well academically as an excuse to slack off. They charted their own journeys, good on them. But as for you, while you have the ability, the capacity, the chance to study… give it your best and aspire to achieve your dreams and plans you have for your own future.

The pursuit of knowledge is not a choice. It is incumbent on you. On all of us.

May Allah swt protect our children and make them intelligent, learned and compassionate human beings always.

Amin.

Source: Cikgu Roszalina Rawi

November 28, 2016
Rohaishah Hamid: Dirt Poor And Struggling With Family Problems, I Persevered To Finally Become A Teacher

6 years ago on this date, I remembered having to vacate the HDB flat I lived in at Sengkang with my mum. I was 18, still schooling and was given monthly allowance by MOE, and she was ill and unemployed for the longest time. The the both of us had no place to go. We resorted to this mutual agreement to separate; we had to find different respective friends who could give us shelter separately, whether it was for a day, a week, a month, a year, whichever would suffice.

She found a friend she could live with for a few months so I was relieved. On my end, I had friends here and there who offered shelter, offered sleepovers, and on some unlucky days when they couldn’t, I would spend most nights staying up at beaches or void decks with my bags of unwashed and unused clothes and cheapskate art materials plus my crumpled assignments, looking for a plan, in hope of another saviour to take me home. I seeked help from MPs, from different Family Service Centres, different Homeless Shelters, they could only help so much.

Prior to the days when I had no where to go, I couldn’t do my assignments, I had no money to get materials, didn’t even eat or sleep proper, I ended up skipping school very often, I even skipped exams. I was already bonded with MOE’s 9-year teaching contract at that point, my absenteeism and grades were horrendous. I couldn’t graduate after my 3rd year of NAFA. So I had to retake hell lot of modules. My allowance from MOE was being taken away. I had to pay for the modules I had to retake, and having no allowance led me to work 2 jobs while schooling.

Working 2 jobs allowed me to earn just enough for a decent rental of a room, open market, which was ridiculously costly. But I was devastated and separated from my mum too long, eventually I managed to afford renting a room with my mum, at a few different strangers houses and the owner was present in their homes while we stayed. Unpleasant experience it was, living in someone’s house you don’t even know, they had rules like you can’t cook, can’t use the living room, you can only do your laundry once a week and all. They assume and accuse you of every minor or major thing that could possibly go wrong in that premise. It was like living in a prison cell with no privacy yet numerous obligations. But I couldn’t complain. It was better that at least me and my mum were sheltered together.

Spent a year to clear all my modules but I still failed and couldn’t graduate after my 4th year. NAFA was going to expel me, MOE was going to terminate my bond, which simply meant I had to pay all the liquidated damages back. I appealed, begged, pleaded for them to give me one more year. So again I had to pay for the modules I retook, rental cost got more expensive when we moved from one place to another each time our contract ended, mum’s health worsensed, so I worked 3 jobs instead.

At that breaking point, I kept reminding myself one thing, that I already spent my teenage secondary school years in an abusive and dysfunctional household while I was still staying in my own home at Sengkang. Already spent years of my teenage life working in KFC every night after school even during O’Levels, no electricity at home so I studied with a candle and spent the remainders of my sleepless nights taking care of my sick mum. I had an elder sister who used to provide for us but she passed away. I was reminded of when people from the Subordinate Court crashed my place to seize all our furniture because of debts so my house became bare and empty. Or when people splashed paint out my door because of debts again. Or when policemen had to keep coming to make or break a scene. And I thought THAT was bad. Until I lost my home eventually. Felt like I lost everything.

Finally graduated from NAFA after my 5th year and moved on to NIE. Life got better when I stepped into NIE because I finally started receiving monthly allowance all over again. I could finally quit my 3 jobs, and in that same year HDB finally granted me a home to stay in. Eventually graduated from NIE and started my teaching career till today. I never had to look back since then.

Throughout that journey, I owe my life to my friends and teachers from secondary school, my colleagues from KFC, a few close classmates from NAFA and some other friends and roommates I met along the way, for seeing me through and providing for me when no one else could. I wouldn’t have stayed sane without you guys. Sure, like every other typical kid I’ve been depressed as hell, suicidal attempts were endless, and now when I think about it, I laugh at myself. Thank you God, for watching over me and my mum, and for blessing me with amazing friends. They were the family I never had.

Source: Rohaishah Hamid

September 16, 2015
Father Resorts To Crowfunding To Pay $69,000 To MOE For Daughter’s Failure In Teaching Program

Dear Friends,

Our whole family was delighted that our second daughter got through the teaching interview. She was an exemplary student in school and her strongest characteristic is that, she does not give up in all her pursuits.

She got all the relevant teachers and even her PE teacher to write her testimonials in order to support her application to join the teacher’s trainee programme for ‘O’ Level students.

Prior to this, my daughter had already gained entry to one of the diploma courses in the Polytechnic through their Direct Admission exercise, where they base the qualification on the student’s preliminary examination.

She qualified for health and fitness, event management and nursing courses. If we had a crystal ball, we would not have opted for the teaching course.

I had always thought of my daughter’s strong determination to overcome all odds to succeed in life would enable her to be successful in any course that she took. This is after seeing her excel in the National Team in Silat (Malay Martial Arts) and doing well in training others to master the skill.

She even cleared her studies in the Polytechnic even though she had never studied chemistry and additional mathematics during her secondary school years.

Our main intention for her to take up the profession was because of the values she can pass on to her students, if she were to become a teacher eventually.

She proved herself well when she was doing the course at NIE scoring over 3 points for her GPA. The practicum was supposed to be just a formality before she became a teacher.

Life is known to throw you a curved ball and we were shocked when my daughter did not get through her first practicum despite almost getting a pass for the second observation.

She had to pay $700 to do the second practicum without getting any allowance for it.

This is very stressful for everyone because it is at the tail-end of the course and the amount to be paid back to MOE is certainly much more compared to if she were to drop out of the course earlier.

At the second practicum, she had to take it in a different school. It was as though she started from ground zero because the school’s culture was different from the previous school.

She did not go to a higher ranking school so actually she was in a worse position coupled with the mentors having no interest to coach anyone.

One mentor was furthering her studies during the night and the other mentor had lost all passion for teaching. The other mentor has since left the teaching profession.

My daughter wanted to do her best at this second practicum but it seemed that nothing was going her way.

The following is her personal account of what she went through at the second practicum.

1. I spent sleepless nights to prepare the lesson plan and taken every feedback to improve it and work on it.

2. I spent a lot of time improving my lesson plans, I did my very best to execute everything I have planned during lesson. Due to the amount of time I spent improvising the lesson plan, it hinder my progress to prepare for my other topics.

3. I have spared time to participate in preparing for teacher’s day celebration. I choreographed a presentation by the students for the occasion which have taken much of my own time.

4. I am involved and present in every Judo session and wrote a reflection about what I had observed

5. I paid $700+ to redo my practicum and when I explained to Ms June (CT 2). She said that money doesn’t go to them. I was taken back by this reaction and felt lost.

6. Ms Yati (CT 1), she was taking part-time degree studies, she made me felt that I was a burden to her hence, I dared not approach her for help. She too had sleepless nights, her son was falling sick most of that time. I felt stress about it. She did try to share with me about her problems and how she was able to overcome it.

7. She could only spend a certain amount of time with me as she has to complete her own assignments.

8. Ms June (CT 2) was planning to resign and she did.

9. I came very early to school at 6am to prepare equipments for students so that I was able to save time and able to carry out my lesson smoothly.

10. I tried to approach to Ms June (CT 2) for advice and motivation to persevere; she said that if I failed this practicum, I have a diploma to get a stable career and pay the liquidated damages and the numbers will eventually go down.

11. I have a friend in the same school, she’s a classmate of mine. She too was teaching the same subject as me. The CTs goes to her and tell her what were my flaws and finding out from her what was wrong with me. My friend would come to me and tell me what they had spoken about me. Why must they do that instead of discussing this with me directly?

12. My friend and I, we quarrelled about it because I was unhappy that the CTs went through her instead of facing me. The CTs tried to find out more from her about me whether I am always this emotional. I felt that this situation was as if they were talking behind my back.

13. This caused me to build a barrier between myself and the CTs. I was clear that I have to work together with them. Due to this incident, I dared not to speak or seek help from anyone.

14. When my NIE supervisor wanted me to do a reflection, I did and email to her. I never got any reply from her on how I could overcome it.

15. A week before the moderation, I came to my senses and told the subject head; Ms Mai that I want to put all this behind and forgive my friend, I want to keep moving forward and do my best in the moderation.

16. I went back home and take every feedback and make amends. The feedback that kept appearing was that there was no link in my PowerPoint slides and in my delivery. I should add more visual so to cater the different learning needs of the students.

17. I felt the moderation was my only hope that I could prove to them I have not given up. I had searched for hours, videos and clear explanations for the terms which were one of the areas of improvement that I felt I did quite well but still it was not significant enough

18. I have done well in NIE as I passed all the modules.

19. I was late once because of the traffic jam. The rest of the week I reported punctually to work. (unquote)

The thing that we feared most has now dawned upon us. My daughter is now slapped hard with a SGD$69,000.00 debt.

What is worse than this is, the diploma that she received from this course is too specialized for teaching and have no commercial value. This means that she had wasted 4 years of her life pursuing something that cannot be used unless she is a teacher.

So friends, this is where we as a family are now. We are burdened with a debt of SGD$69,000/-. We cannot afford to pay and have exhausted all avenues for appeal, including to the Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. MOE says our daughter has to pay and there is no other alternative.

We appeal to your good sense to help us in our bad financial times, so that, as a family, we can move on and have closure to this horrendous episode in our lives. No amount is too small for us. We thank everyone for reading and understanding our plight and donating to us.

May God bless you all!

Your humble family of 5!

Editor’s note: Zulkifli Jabal is a regular volunteer at our charity events and his wife joins him regularly. The crowdfunding site is listed here –https://life.indiegogo.com/…/help-pay-liquidated-fee-after-…

– See more at: http://www.transitioning.org/…/father-resorts-to-crowdfun…/…

Source: Gilbert Goh

April 1, 2015