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English Literacy Program for Padma County
Project Manager: Tashitso (Joy)
Train 90 students for one month to be sufficiently proficient in English. Improve the students' English level and aid them in passing the government employment exam and getting further education.
Funds needed: $2,019 (15,699 rmb)
John Li Funded this project |
Tashitso is from Golok autonomous Tibetan prefecture, Qinghai Province, China. She graduated in 2005 with an Associated degree in English from Qinghai Normal University Nationalities Department's English Training Program.
View photos of project location
Project Location:
This project is located in Padma County. Padma is in Golok Prefecture, the most southern part of Qinghai Province. Padma is on the boundary of Sichuan Province and Qinghai Province. It is 857 kilometers from Xining City, the capital of Qinghai.
Education
There are over 7,000 school aged children in Padma County, but only half can attend school. The number of children who attend school in Padma County is 3,791 students. The other 3,212 children stay at home and work with their families.
There are about 5,800 households and 23,521 residents in Padma County. There are 8,313 females, 8205 male and 7003 children . About 1,600 students are in the primary school; 1,188 students are in Middle School and High School, and there are about 1,003 students attending Normal school, College and University.
Most of the older people in this County have never been to school. They speak Amdo dialect of Tibetan and their children are sent to school knowing little, if any Chinese. Because they did not need formal education in their lives many parents think that education is not so important for their children. As a result many students are suffering from low levels of education. This puts the children of this generation at a great disadvantage in their lives.
For example, these days every student must pass the exam from the PRC government to find a government job. This exam is in Chinese and English. Tibetan students must learn two foreign languages very well (English and Chinese) in order to pass this exam otherwise there is little possibility of them getting a job. The level of English proficiency in this County is very low, especially among the students from Tibetan schools. They are not taught English until they enter high school. This is the one of main reasons why many young Tibetan students do not pass this exam.
Most of the employees in Padma County are native Chinese speaking people, not Tibetans. This is because, for Tibetans, Chinese is their second language and it is not quite as fluent as a native speaking Han Chinese. For this reason learning English is one of the few ways that Tibetan people can compete for available jobs.
Income
There are both Tibetan nomads and farmers in Padma County. The families who are living in northern Padma County are nomads and people in the lower parts of Padma County are farmers. The farmer's annual income is about 400RMB cash per year. This is from selling their surplus products such as barley. For the nomads the average income is 600RMB cash income per year. This is from selling wool, yak hair and surplus butter or cheese. The households use that money to pay taxes and buy the daily life necessities such as salt, cooking oil and flour.
For the nomads, each household's tax is different because it depends on the number of yaks that they own. The taxes are as follows: 3RMB per year for each female yak, 2RMB for each male yak and each calf. Each household owns about 10-15 milking yaks, 8-10 male yaks and 3-5 horses. Each household owns about 10-15 milking yaks, 8-10 male yaks and 3-5 horses.
The farmers own about 3-4mu of farmland for each household. (Mu is a Chinese land measure unit; one mu equals 666.66 square meters.) This has been their land for many generations. In 1999, the Chinese government established a new policy called "Rain Forest" to protect environment. They took all the farmland that was owned by the farming households and relocated them. These households no longer have a means to live. As compensation the government said that each household would get food annually of about 5 bags of rice, 5 bags of barley and 4 bags of flour. The farmers were not required to work for this food. But in 2004 this system stopped without giving any clear reason. Now the households need to buy all the food that they used to produce when they owned the land. Therefore, this system brought a heavy financial burden on farming households.
PROJECT GOALS
The overarching goal of the project is to improve the students' English level and aid them in passing the government employment exam and getting further education.
The immediate goal of the project is to trai n 90 students for one month to be sufficiently proficient in English.
Problems
1.Tibetan students must pass the standard English exam to enter College or University. There are not so many Tibetan students who are doing Master degrees or Doctoral degrees because no matter how good their school grades are, their English is poor. They have to pass the Standard English exam named Band 4 or 6 to gain access to higher education. But because there is no English class or very few English classes in Tibetan Middle Schools or even High schools, it is very difficult for Tibetan students to pass the standard English exam. Therefore many Tibetan students are not able to attain further education.
2. English is now established as a universal language. Hence, In China, English is one of the main subjects required to get a proper job. For example, many Tibetan students in my hometown have difficulties finding permanent or government jobs in their own regions after they graduated from Normal school or college because they did not get the chance to learn English when they were young and their English is poor.
When high school or college graduates apply for a job they have to sit an exam (which is called Gong Wu Yaun in Chinese). They have to pass English the exam otherwise they won't get a job. Each year only one or two students from Padma County pass the government job exam and work in their own area.
3. In addition, when the students are in University or College, they have to pass Standard English exams, named English Exam Band A and English Exam Band B, otherwise they won't get their degree when they graduate. So proficiency in English continues to be very important even if they are fortunate enough to be accepted into University.
4. Many Tibetan students who could not pass the Standard English exams have low self esteem—they think their English levels can never improve and they have low motivation.
Solution
The project manager (Tashitso) and two teachers from Padma Tibetan Middle School ( Labao and Danzhijia) discussed how to address the lack of English language skills in Padma county's students. We identified that students studying in Golok Normal school were especially at risk because they did not have earlier education opportunities to learn English for the exam. We want to provide a program to give these students an intensive English language course to help them at the critical point of preparing for the Gong Wu Yuan exam.
We propose to hold this program from January 13 to February 13th, 2007.
The project is aimed at those students who have to pass government job exam (Gong Wu Yuan), but have poor English. The project will run for one month. It will provide four (4) qualified English language teachers and 150 textbooks to Padma County. There will be 7 hours of classes each day and each class will be 45 minutes long. The School will provide the classrooms and the rooms for the teachers without charge. In this one-month we will provide intensive training to the students who are facing the problem of not passing the examination for a job position or not passing the examination to enter a good university or getting further education to improve their English.
Benefits
1. If this project happens, it will improve students' English level in Padma County and there will be high possibility that the students can pass the Standard English exam and it will give them a higher possibility to do further education.
2. The opportunity for the students to get a government job and work in their own areas will be much improved from their improved English.
3. Students from the intensive classes will take their improved English back into their normal classroom and to their homes. That way, the level of English spoken in the Padma community will also improve.
4. If there are more examples of Tibetan students who are good at English, then it will give confidence and hope for younger generations to learn English and take English exams by themselves.
Selection Process
1. The trainees' age should be between 15-27. (The age of high school students is often older because they start school very late, sometimes as late as 11 or12 years.) It's very important to train young people because they are not only role models for younger generations, but also many young people are losing their confidence through their failure in exams and facing the many difficulties of getting proper jobs in their own hometown.
2. The trainees must be middle school students, high school students, Normal school students, College students or University students.
3. The project manager and the local teachers will choose 90% of trainees from among either College or University ( Qinghai Nationalities University , Qinghai Normal University, Northwest Normal University , Hainan Teacher's College and Golok Normal School ) alumni. Special consideration will be given to students who have taken several Gong Wu Yuan exams and have lost their confidence from their failed results.
4. Ten percent of trainees will be high school or middle school students. These students will continue to study and will take the exam before entering college or university. These students will be choosen by the project manager and the local teachers according to their class grades and their family conditions—giving higher priority to those from impoverished families.
Interviews:
Tashitso interviewed residents of Padma County about the need for English.
A. Do you think it's important to know English?
B. “Especially for the young people, they have to know this subject in order to have a better life.”
A. Why do you think there are only a few people who know this subject well?
B.“This is because of lack of outside contact and there are very few English classes and in class English teachers teach English in Chinese, so we do not have opportunities to practice English and also because our Chinese is poor and we have more pressures and difficulties to learn English even it is important.”
A. How would this program improve your living conditions?
B. “This would mentally and physically improve both the students and their parents' living conditions. To fulfill with someone's mental desire is more important than anything else like material things. The worth of someone's work and the amount of salary is decided according to their Education.”
A. As a young Tibetan student, what is your opinion toward English?
B. “I am very regretful that I did not learn this subject when I was young.” This young man is still at school. He had an idea to learn this subject, but he could not find an opportunity and they did not teach this subject at the schools he was at. He thinks it's very helpful for everyone to study English.
Gender equality
Because of the low school enrollment of girls, there are only few girls who can find proper jobs in their hometown; therefore in this program at least 60 students will be female of the 90 students in total. The project manager (Tashitso) observes that in her hometown females are usually the housewives. It is very important to educate them because they are the ones who usually take care of the children and to bring up the children, therefore there is a great need to educate females. Also, in Padma County , there are no women doing projects other than Tashitso. So Tashitso's role as project manager provides a positive example to other Tibetan women.
Governmental support:
The project manager (Tashitso) got the permission from local Education Department and Padma Tibetan Middle School before she wrote the proposal in July 2006 (summer vacation). Padma Tibetan Middle School will provide the classrooms and dormitories.
Project committee team:
Besides the main project manager (Tashitso), two teachers from Padma Tibetan Middle School will administer the project: Labao and Danzhijia. Both of the additional managers are graduates of Padma Tibetan Middle School who are experienced teachers. Danzhijia is the headmaster of Padma Tibetan Middle School . He is 54 years old and he has been the headmaster for 10 years. Labao is a very respected Tibetan teacher from Tibetan Middle school. He is 36 years and he has been teacher for 12 years. They are very responsible, professional people and we are very fortunate that they are involved in this project.
English teachers:
The project will employ four young Tibetans to teach English for the duration of the program:
Tashitso (f)—the project manager, graduated from Qinghai Teachers college with an Associates degree in English and Tibetan in December of 2005. She has been a teacher at Ganzi Teacher's Normal School in Sichuan Province since August of 2006. She passed the Band 4 and Band 6 exams, received a high TOEFL score, and was awarded high grades in her English classes.
Suonandorji (m)—graduated in 2006 from Qinghai Teachers college with an Associate's degree in English and Tibetan. He has been a teacher at Ganzi Teacher's Normal School in Sichuan Province since August of 2006. He passed the Band 4 and Band 6 exams, received a high TOEFL score, and was awarded high grades in his English classes.
Mela (f)—is in the final year of the Associates' degree program in English and Tibetan at Qinghai Teachers College . She passed the Band 4 and Band 6 exams, received a high TOEFL score, and has been awarded high grades in her English classes.
Lhamotso(f)— is in the final year of the associates degree program in English and Tibetan at Qinghai Teachers College . She passed the Band 4 and Band 6 exams, received a high TOEFL score, and has been awarded high grades in her English classes.
All four of the chosen English teachers want to pursue careers as English teachers and have previous experience teaching. They wanted to be part of this project to gain experience in teaching English and work with experienced older teachers.
The steps of the project:
1. Permission received from Padma Education Deparment to hold this training.
2. Padma Tibetan Middle School agreed to cooperate with the Project.
3. Classrooms and dormitories will be provided by Padma Tibetan Middle School.
4. Three teachers committed to the project. (The fourth is Tashitso, the project manager.)
5.Background information about the proposal (summarized in this document).
6.Interviews with people from Padma County.
7.Proposal is written, awaiting funding.
8.Local contribution from the students will be collected at the time of project implementation.
9.Purchase of text books. The books will be purchased from Xinhua bookstore in Xining, Qinghai Province prior to the project implementation.
10.Padma Tibetan Middle School will provide the rooms for classes and this will also be the place where the teachers will live.
11.Teachers from Padma Tibetan Middle School will recruit 90 students.
12.Project manager to travel to Padma County and transport the books from Xining City to Banma County Town.
13.At the beginning of the Intensive English classes the project team will hold a meeting both with the students and the teachers to tell the class rules, such as if they are late the class for three times they are not allowed to join any another classes. If they miss one class without having the teacher's permission, they are also not allowed to enter the rest classes.
14.Start Class.
15.Distribute the textbooks to the students and also give them the class schedule.
Assess progress of the project :
16.Interview the students and their parents about this program 15 days after the project begins.
17.Collect other information for final report, including pictures.
18.Complete classes.
19.Final assessment of program, including student assessment.
20.Write draft report to donor
21.Send final report with photos and receipts.
22. July/August of 2007: Tashitso will look at the results of official exam scores to measure the success of the project.
Timeframe
In total this project will take 36 days to complete (this does not include project assessment or writing the report).
Five days for initial planning in Xining and in Padma County, including: buying the textbooks in Xining City, arranging the rooms for classes and the teachers, recruiting the students, and planning the classes.
One day to hold a meeting among both the students and the teachers to tell the class rules before the program starts.
The English education program itself will run for 30 days. It will be held during the winter semester break, from January 8th, 2007 to February 8th, 2007.
Report to donor one month after project completed.
Detailed Budget:
Donor Contribution
Item |
Price per item rmb |
Number of items |
Donor Contribution
rmb |
Elementary English Book |
10 |
90 |
900 |
Active American English |
13 |
60 |
780 |
Food |
30rmb per person per day/31 days |
4 teachers |
3,720 |
Fuel (coal and yak-dung) |
803 per tone
9 per sack |
3ton of coal and 10 sacks of yak-dung for both the teachers and the students. |
2,499 |
Transportation Fee |
|
150text books
|
300 |
School Supplies |
|
Notebooks, chalks, Pens and Pencils for the students.
|
300 |
Salary |
1,800rmb per teacher for a month.
|
4 teachers |
7,200 |
Cash contribution |
20rmb/per student |
90 |
|
Classrooms and rooms for the teachers
|
140rmb/room/per month |
3classrooms
2 rooms for the teachers |
|
Management expenses
|
|
|
|
Management fee |
|
|
|
Total |
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15,699rmb |
Local Contribution
Item |
Price per item rmb |
Number of items |
Local Contribution
rmb |
Cash contribution |
20rmb/per student |
90 |
1800 |
Classrooms and rooms for the teachers
|
140rmb/room/per month |
3classrooms
2 rooms for the teachers |
700 |
Management expenses
|
|
|
200 |
Management fee |
|
|
500 |
Total |
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|
3,200rmb |
Total Project Cost:
Donor Contribution |
Local Contribution |
Total Cost
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15,699rmb( 2,011U.S.dollars) |
3,200rmb |
18,899rmb |
*The project manager (Tashitso) calculated the teachers' food according to local restaurant prices. The teachers will be given a food stipend every day, and will eat at restaurants. Tashitso calculated the cost of hiring a cook, and it was more expensive than if the teachers go to restaurants. Therefore, she thinks it's better to eat in restaurant and the teachers can order what they want. She thinks it's very important to have a tasty and nutritional food in order to keep their (the teachers) health stable because each teacher has 7 hours classes per day. The books will be purchased from Xining City and transported by bus (it costs 300rmb) because it costs less than by mail.
Sustainability
This project is very sustainable because the majority of the students who will attend this program will become teachers in this area in the future. They will graduate from Qinghai Normal Normal University, Qinghai Nationalities University, Golok Normal School and Hainan teacher's College. These schools are Teaching Normal Schools and the students are majoring in teaching, so most of them are trying to find jobs as teachers. Successful students of this program will find it easier to get teaching jobs. They will use what they learned during this program to teach their own students in the future and to pass what they learnt to their friends and relatives in their spare time. The project manager (Tashitso) will monitor this project through interviewing the students, their parents and teachers, she will also look at the result of official exam scores in July or August to measure whether it's successful project or not.
The project manager (Tashitso) believes that it is possible to build very good English foundation for them through her previous experiences. She has worked with several English literacy programs in different areas in Xunhua County(Xunhua Tibetan Middle School) and Hualong County(One of primary School) in Qinghai for one month in Qinghai Province in 2003, 2004 and 2005. There were about 35 --40 students in one class and there were three classes. Trainees were beginning English learners and none of them could correctly pronounce simple vocabulary. After one month's English training program, the students could have short conversations among each other, could write a short introduction about themselves (100-200 words); most of them had no problem reading short stories; and they could answer questions about the stories.
Additional information about the project manager:
T ashitso has done a solar panel project for Gala village funded by the British Embassy, two second hand clothing projects organized by Sue Bishop at the British Consulate in Shanghai, a book project for ‘Pros Sgang Primary School funded by Tendel group, and a solar cooker and school improvement project for ‘Pros Sgang Primary School one of the primary schools in Padma County, Qinghai Province funded by Tendel Group.
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