For 28 year old Australian teacher, Hayley Tew, her experience working as a volunteer in India has grounded her as a teacher and opened her eyes to different ways of approaching a traditional classroom.
She has also learned how to achieve maximum impact with limited resources.
And for Muktangen, the organisation she volunteered with through ATMA, and potentially a number of other Indian NGO’s, she has left behind a significant legacy – an English teacher training programme for slum women which has become a model for other organisations.
She worked daily with trainee teachers – some of them women who had not left their homes since marriage as young as 16 years of age – teachng them English and training them to teach English to children.
“It was a steep learning curve for me, teaching English as a second language” Hayley said recently. “My experience in India has made working with ESL students in mainstream classes back here in Australia significantly easier and more manageable”.
She added that hearing stories from the women trainee teachers and their lives before Muktangen had a powerful impact on her.
“The school completely changed their lives” she said. “With Muktangen, they were learning, part of a community, giving back, earning money and feeling valued for their contribution.
“Now if that isn’t a worthwhile cause to be involved with, I honestly don’t know what is” she said.
Hayley described ATMA as very well organised and said from the beginning of her volunteering stint she felt like she didn’t have to worry about anything and that if she had any problems, there were people to talk to, who would help her as much as she needed.
Her advice to future volunteers? “Be honest with yourself, leave your pre-conceptions at the door and soak up everything that comes your way”.
