Back to the Future

Last week, two old students visited me at my cram school. They had attended my classes over fifteen years ago and the only way I knew who they were was when I recognized their mother, who, in typical Taiwanese fashion, had not changed much at all. The younger brother was as tall as me and told me how he had already gotten a master’s in computer science and had just finished his military service. At a recent interview, he was asked to have a five-minute conversation in English. He said that it stretched out to almost twenty minutes as they discussed his travels to Japan and the Czech Republic, as well as one of his passions, American sports.

I had actually run into the older sister a few months ago at the Foreign Affairs Office in Chiayi. When I had entered, I first spoke to a young official sitting at the counter nearest the door. Suddenly, I heard my name from the back of the room, but when I looked along the counter and at the rows of empty chairs to the left, all I saw were two female civil servants at their work stations. So, I simply ignored the call, thinking that I must have heard something that sounded like my name.

“You don’t recognize me, do you, Hugo?” asked one of the women. As I walked further into the office, I saw that she looked to be around twenty-five years old, but you know how hard it is to tell with Taiwanese women.

“Sorry, but do I teach one of your children?”

She rolled her eyes and then looked straight at me. “I was one of your students!” She had graduated with an English degree and had been working at the Foreign Affairs Ministry for more than a half dozen years now. Though I must admit that I had no idea who she actually was until I returned home and dug up an old picture of her class, it was great having a conversation with her, hearing how English had helped her at work and boosted her career.

Unlike most English teachers in Taiwan, I often get to see how my teaching has affected my students. Dozens of former students have gone onto study in the US, Canada, the UK, Australia and New Zealand. One former student who had been a liaison between an Italian company and the Taiwan Hi-Speed Rail told me about his new-found appreciation for wine. One day, I ran into another who had attended Wenzao, the premier language university located in Kaohsiung, and we spoke about her semester in Frankfurt mostly in German, her second foreign language at university.

So, to all those teachers out there who look at their job as simply a job, realize that, for better and hopefully not worse, you have a huge impact on individual students that will last their entire lives. What you need to recognize is the atmosphere that you create in your own class goes beyond grammar and proper pronunciation. The one common thread that runs through the successful students I have met over the years is a lack of fear of screwing up coupled with a knack for remembering mistakes and not making them again.

As most of you will be at your current position for a short period of time, realize that you are providing the building blocks, the base on which the next teacher can expand your students’ ability and shape their future, a future that they cannot imagine, but will be upon them in a short time. Hopefully, you will have provided them with advantages that will open the world to them and their dreams.