WHEN MALAYSIAN TEACHERS BECOME PROFESSIONAL SPIES

What prompts me to write this article tonight? The truth is if I have a choice I wouldn't have started this blog. I have been wondering what would be the fate of Edelweiss56 (google the article "Severely Bullied Teacher" and you will know who she is) if the principal had not done anything dreadful to me. Edelweiss56 would probably have to suffer in silence again as no one would help her to write her blog and make her plight known to the world. I live in my own world. I don't care much about what is happening around me. It was the principal's bullying tactics that sparked off the courage and determination in me to seek justice for all those teachers who are in the same boat as me. And I am writing this article tonight to make it known to the world what some our teachers have metamorphosized into in order to please the principal and enhance the principal's bullying tactics.

Students should never emulate their teachers. Why am I saying this? Firstly look at the PPSMI. Despite the Malaysian Government's efforts to make our teachers learn English, the majority of them ended up learning nothing. But lo and behold! When it comes to spying and back-stabbing our Malaysian teachers rank the highest in the world. This is not my opinion alone. My friends who are teaching in other schools are telling me the same thing. Competition amongst the teachers are great. What do they compete for? The principal's affection since this would mean they can get high marks for their prestasi or they can even be a guru cemerlang. And to do so they have to back stab each other and become professional spies. My principal never enters the staffroom but she knows exactly what is happening there including how many minutes the teachers were late for class because of the "pot luck". The pot luck was banned forever because of that. Luckily I am never involved with the pot luck. Apart from hotel food, I only eat the food that I cook myself. If anyone wants to give the principal a piece of her mind, it is not necessary to tell the principal face to face. Just say it out loud in the staffroom and the principal will get the message in no time.

What makes our teachers stoop so low and gladly lick the shoes of the principal? Because they want to be guru cemerlang. So you know now what guru cemerlang means. And since the guru cemerlangs are those who would become the future principals this clearly explains why there are so many bullying cases in schools where the biggest bullies of all are none other than the principals themselves. The Rekod Penilaian Prestasi is another culprit. Because the teachers want high marks for their prestasi they would go all the way out to please the principal even if it means betraying their colleagues. Never mind. This is a dog eat dog world - the survival of the fittest. To survive and be the fittest they have to bring down others - this is human nature. Charles Darwin taught them. So this means that if a teacher wants to get high marks for her rekod prestasi she must be a good spy and she must do a lot of back stabbing. She must also know how to despise the teachers whom the principal is not in favour of. If the principal is not in favour of a particular teacher then this professional spy would take the opportunity to do some back stabbing and some spying job on her for the principal even though this particular teacher was once her good friend. What are friends anyway? They don't worth any marks. The markah prestasi is more important. Being a guru cemerlang is more important.

I don't accuse people. I write from experience. There was once a teacher who was a good friend of mine. Since the principal sent me to the gallows for asking her to certify my certs for my PhD application (as I've said earlier there was no supervisor for my field but the damage is done) her attitude towards me changed. She pretended that she didn't see me whenever she walked past me. Edelweiss56 told me that this teacher must the one who complained to the principal that she (Edelweiss56) did not do anything for the debate since both of them were in charge of the debate. I actually saw Edelweiss56 in the library training the students when I went into the library to read newspapers. Puan R (the teacher who lodged a police report against the principal) told me it was the same teacher who betrayed her - telling bad things about her to the principal. That was why the principal interrogated Puan R for three hours in the presence of other witnesses. During the interrogation the principal even called this teacher in front of Puan R to confirm that Puan R has indeed committed a "crime".

This teacher is not the only spy in my school. Of course there are others and it is not difficult to tell from their behaviour that they have been elevated to a higher position i.e. professional spy. They all react in the same way. People who used to be nice and friendly but who are no longer nice and friendly are those who have become spies. You don't even have to ask them. Their behaviour is enough proof. And of course you can see them spying outside the classroom. Looking for evidence to penalize me and then report to the principal I suppose. This is their mission. Why should they be nice and friendly to someone whom the principal is bullying? I consider this a very shameful thing to happen in Malaysia. The school environment should be a harmonious environment where the teachers' most important mission is to educate the children. However, the opposite seems to be true. Since when did our principals become big bullies and our teachers become professional spies? Since when did back stabbing become the norm in our Malaysian schools? Is it because time has changed? What will our society become in the year 2020? Surely we do not want our children to emulate their teachers and grow up to become hypocrites! Perhaps it's time for the ministry to look into what is really going on in the schools instead of just focusing on guru cemerlang, markah prestasi cemerlang and pengetua cemerlang. We do not want our future generation to become hypocrites cemerlang.