Empower Cambodian children with English language

Dear Supporters, Teachers, Students, Parents and Family Members,

I am deeply grateful for your generous support in enabling Cambodian children to receive quality English education at ODC.With no more threats of Covid-19, day-to-day living in the communities has returned to normal and this has allowed teachers and students back on campus, and with newly built airport, international tourists have returned to Cambodia and businesses are starting to flourish.

2023 has been a hugely busy and successful year for ODC with record number of students enrolled, professional staff training and development conducted, two new local teachers welcomed to our team, standardization of curriculum updated and evaluated, student expectations raised and school facilities expanded!

In 2023 ODC ran 10 classes; at the end each month, we conducted monthly tests to evaluate our students’ progress. Throughout the year, the number of students dropped slightly as some families moved back to their provinces. 173 students sat for the end-of-year exam in November and have achieved great academic results and attendance. 123 students exceeded ODC’s expectations of achieving >80% and have been moved to the next level.

Our ODC team is comprised of a headmaster who also plays a teaching role, 4 qualified teachers, 2 teaching scholars, and 3 volunteers. With support from each other, each member worked tirelessly to meet our students’ need. We encourage and complement, support and mentor one another. As a team, we regularly attended staff training and development to learn a variety of teaching skills – theoretical and practical methods on teaching the four macro skills in English. All training is conducted by trainees from trusted and well-known English teaching schools. With our dedicated and inspiring team, ODC has been able to provide excellent English lessons to underprivileged children. ODC is symbolized by the tree of life, with the core values of compassion, honesty and integrity at its roots and our team lives by these values daily and instill them in our children.

At the end of this year ODC was delighted to welcome two new members to our international Board. The role of this board is to work closely with the founder and headmaster, to fulfil the mission of the organization. The Board ensues that ODC meets Cambodian legal requirements and remains accountable to its donors. One of the main roles of the Board is to ensure that the organization has sufficient resources to advance its mission. We are very grateful to all our Board members for taking an active role in securing funds.

Last year, we celebrated the wonderful achievement of one of our students, who after 8 years of studying English at ODC, was able to attend a university in Cambodia to study TEFL (Teaching of English as a Foreign Language). She is now able to fulfil her dream of becoming an English teacher. She is a remarkable young lady who imbues the great values of ODC and is an amazing role model for our younger students. She is now employed as a part-time English teacher at ODC. At the end of this year, another student who is a teaching scholar at ODC will be able to apply at the same university to study TEFL. Without financial assistance from a major sponsor and Board Member, along with another NGO, these students would not have the financial means to go to university. Our vision of building good, strong, young leaders with a genuine drive to give back and help their community continues to grow.

Quality of education, students’ safety whilst on campus and a nurturing and positive learning environment are our top priorities. This year, we managed to build a new wall with a long bench where children can sit to wait for their class to begin; a veranda attached to the main building was also added to protect our students from rain and heat. Recently, we have received funding for our aspirational plans, which allows us to start building the school fence and gate, filling up the adjacent land and raising the floor of the 2 older classrooms to mitigate flooding. We are particularly grateful for the support of our newest Board member in helping ODC secure these funds.

In 2024, we plan to increase our student enrollment to 240, adding 2 more classes for younger students, aged 5-9. We will have 12 classes, with a maximum of 20 students per class. We expect to have at least 5 qualified teachers, and will continue to train young students to become future teachers. To accommodate the increasing number of students who are still on the waiting list, we are planning to a build a row of 4 more classrooms on the adjacent land being filled/leveled. We wish to implement this plan as early as possible. Thus, we are looking for additional funding because we want to ensure the long-term impact and sustainability. Our exciting journey in academic year 2024 starts on 8January.

On behalf of the whole ODC team, I express our genuine appreciation to you. Without your support and generosity, it would be impossible to produce the results you are reading throughout this report. I am hopeful this report can share with you our commitment and passion – we are doing what we love, through humanitarian, development and advocacy works, serving those in need. Despite some obstacles, all our efforts are worthwhile with many positive outcomes on the lives of the underprivileged children and communities in Cambodia.

Sincerely

Chhaiya IM

Founder and Headmaster, ODC Organization

P.S.  For those interested in even more detail, please follow this link to our 2023 Annual Report.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1da2u7txlmPv8pv6DoaIK21pbEF_m4Dt3/view?usp=sharing

Dear Supporters, Teachers, Students, Parents and Family Members,

I am pleased to inform you that we are all in good health and spirit and we believe you are, too. We would like to take this opportunity to share with you the progress of our ODC students, teachers and community, and to express our deep gratitude for your continued support and generosity to help make the impossible, possible.

In our previous progress reports, we reported that the lives of Cambodian people have returned to normal without fear of the spread of Covid-19. However, life after the pandemic has posed other pressing issues. Many Cambodian people are in an even worse situation trying to survive as they fight against the high cost of living with rising inflation, unemployment and the global economic crisis, creating a nightmare in the country’s four main economic sectors.; real estate, garment industry, tourism and agriculture. We, the Cambodian people, have high hopes that the newly-elected government and prime minister who took his office on 22nd August, will take corrective actions to ease people’s current situations.

The resilience of our people is evident in the way normal folks make every effort to support their families. No matter what has happened nationwide, educational activities are normal; children go to school on a regular basis and our students come to ODC with readiness and enthusiasm to learn. With high expectations, teachers’ care and professionalism and parents’ cooperation, our students have achieved remarkable outcomes. ODC English lessons begin with students entering and standing to greet their teacher, followed by an hour-long lesson  conducted entirely in English. It brings us a lot of pride and joy to see local children receiving a high quality of English education. The determination and commitment to improving themselves through education will eventually help to transform our nation.

Throughout the course of the year, a number of families have moved back to their provinces and so our present enrolment is at 181 students, with 43 on the waiting list. We hope to enroll more students in 2024, by opening up 2 more classes. Our teaching team comprises of 5 qualified teachers, 3 teacher scholars (one just joined the team on 19th October, 2023 and she is an outstanding student from our top class and dreams to become a teacher), a local volunteer and a headmaster, and together we are all committed to ensuring the best education at ODC. Our team shares a common goal of striving for excellence. With support and encouragement from the board, ODC teaching staff continue to attend teacher training session on a monthly basis and have brought essential teaching skills into their own classrooms. A couple of our teachers will sit for the International English Language Testing System (IELTS) exam at the end of this year. The other teachers will do so, sometime next year, after they have completed an intensive English course at Australian Centre For Education (ACE).

We are particularly proud of one of our teachers, Makara, who is in her final year at university studying TOEFL. Despite her busy schedule, she makes the time to attend monthly teacher training and weekly online lessons, all in the pursuit of excellence. As a consequence, her confidence has grown and she has blossomed into an amazing and effective teacher.  Another of our teachers, Sophy, conducts an additional class on Sunday mornings to further support students who need additional help. Her passion and dedication are outstanding.

ODC is very pleased to announce that Katja, who I met while on holiday in Greece, is joining us as a volunteer. She will teach online remotely, once a week, starting in October. This means that more of our students will have the opportunity to learn with a native speaker. At present, we have a volunteer who conducts her lessons from Australia. This allows our students to vastly improve their skills in listening, speaking, writing and reading in English. ODC welcomes volunteers, either on-site or remotely and if you are interested, please contact me.

We have made physical improvements to our school buildings. We tore down an old wall and built a new one, built a concrete bench and also added a roof to create a dry space for students and parents to gather. Solar panels and lights were installed, providing greater safety at night. All these works were carried out by the Headmaster, so as to keep down cost. There are still a few more things we wish to do to make sure the campus is environmentally safe such as building a fence and raising the adjacent land, allowing us to have more play area for our students. With the high temperatures in the dry season, heatproofing the school roof is a priority. Sometime in the future, we would like to build a library, a listening center and a reception/staff room.

At the end of this year, on 7th and 8th December, we are holding a Parent-Teacher Meeting and celebrating an Award Presentation Day. Three of the Board members will be in attendance in Cambodia to share in our celebration of ODC’s achievements with the local team, parents and students. You are invited to come and say “Hello” to our kids and meet our team.

In closing, we would like to reiterate our whole-hearted gratitude for your on-going supportand generosity. It has been very clear that your commitment to ODC’s cause has been tremendously significant in keeping us moving forward in our endeavor to achieve the betterment of Cambodian society and in particular to open as many doors to opportunity as possible for our students.

Sincerely,

Chhaiya IM

Founder and Headmaster, ODC Organization