Until I took up an academic position in China, it did not occur to me that the teaching profession is so respected. In fact all teaching staff, whether they are teaching primary, secondary or university students are referred to as “teachers”. For me, it felt great being addressed by my students as “teacher” when I stepped into the lecture hall at Zhaoqing University for the first time in March 2019.
当我在高校任教之前，我没有想到教师专业受到如此尊重。事实上，所有的教师，无论是教小学、中学还是大学生，都被称为“老师”。对我来说，当我2019年3月第一次走进肇庆学院的讲堂时，被学生们称为“老师”的感觉是真舒服的。
Every year during the celebration for “teachers’ day” many businesses will give special deals and gifts to teachers in China. The feature image in this post is just one of many of such signs of respect to the teaching profession. I must admit, I will miss this free gift of RMB300 worth of spectacle products this year as I am still unable to travel back to my university from Malaysia due to the COVID-19 pandemic. I have started my second semester of online teaching at the beginning of September 2020.
每年在庆祝“教师节”期间，许多企业都会向中国的教师赠送特价商品和礼物。这篇文章中的特写图片只是对教师职业表示尊重的众多标志之一。很可惜，今年我将错过这个价值￥300的免费眼镜礼品，因为COVID-19疫情关系，我仍然无法从马来西亚返校。从2020年9月我已开始第二个线上教学的学期。
It is precisely due to the respect given to teaching staff that there is a higher requirement for university teaching staff to give more attention to students’ academic performance and their well-being on campus. This is unlike the situation in Malaysia and the UK (where this author was a student for 12 years) where university students are considered as adults. Chasing after students to submit assignments and giving offenders second chances are relatively new experience to me, a veteran of the higher education sector of over two decades!
正是由于对教师的尊重，高校教师更加需关注学生的学业成绩和校园生活。这与马来西亚和英国的情况不同（作者在英国读了12年书），那里的大学生被视为成年人。追着学生提交作业，给违规者第二次机会，对我这一个在高等教育界工作了二十多年的老手来说，还是一次相对新鲜的经历！