A Change of Guard

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Sunday 28 September 2014

Helping Cambodians to Learn English

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By William E. Todd, U.S. Ambassador to the Kingdom of Cambodia

Before coming to Cambodia as the U.S. Ambassador I spent several months studying the Khmer language in the United States with my teacher Samphey Iep.  Having learned several languages including Khmer, I have an appreciation of the work that is required to learn a new language.  This week I received a question from Banroath in Battambang, who writes, “I heard that the U.S. Embassy has English language scholarships.  Why do you think it is important for Cambodians to learn English?”
When I first arrived in Cambodia over two years ago, I was struck by the number of Cambodians who already spoke English and who wanted to practice with a native speaker – from businessmen to tuk-tuk drivers.  To me, this shows that Cambodians understand and appreciate the ways that English can help to drive this country’s economic and social development. 
I truly believe that English is the indispensable language of the 21st century.  You don’t have to take my word for it – just look around the world.  According to statistics, there are approximately 400 million English language learners in China alone.  In Singapore, school lessons are taught almost entirely in English starting in primary school.Children in Europe are starting to learn English at an increasingly early age.  What do all of these places have in common?  They all know that speaking English is the key to global competitiveness.
English is the language of global business.  According to the Harvard Business Review, an increasing number of multinational companies such as Airbus, Nokia, and Samsung are using English as the common corporate language in an effort to improve communication and performance across geographic borders.  Here in Southeast Asia, English will be the common language of the ASEAN Economic Community when it is introduced in 2015.   English is also the most common language on the Internet, and according to one estimate 80-90 percent of all scholarly articles are written in English.

For these reasons, it comes as no surprise that English is the most popular foreign language for Cambodian students.  I am confident that with improved English language skills, Cambodians will have more and better opportunities to compete in the job market.  Speaking English is good for the economy, as greater numbers of young Cambodians with strong English skills will attract international businesses, bringing in foreign investment.  This in turn will produce higher-paying jobs that can become the foundation of economic growth in Cambodia for decades to come.

With strong English language skills, young Cambodians will also be well-positioned to attend institutions of higher learning in the United States and in many other countries around the world.  This will be very important to Cambodia’s continued development because Cambodian professionals will need the knowledge and expertise to direct and lead advancements here at home, particularly in fields such as tourism, agriculture, and manufacturing.
The U.S. Embassy believes strongly in the power of English and works hard to promote English-language instruction in Cambodia, both through direct scholarships and through teacher training.  The U.S. government’s flagship program is the English Access Microscholarship Program, which offers two-year English language scholarships to disadvantaged teenagers around the world.  In Cambodia, the Embassy currently works with outstanding partner institutions such as the Islamic Community Kan Imam-San of Cambodia in Kampong Chhnang and the American Education Center in Phnom Penh, who teach lessons at six locations across the country.  More than 1000 Cambodian students have participated in the program since it began in 2004.
We also work with teachers to improve the quality of English language instruction that is being taught in Cambodian schools through direct training and through our support of English language conferences.  The U.S. Agency for International Development is tapping into advanced technology to help teachers to improve their skills through a program that will develop a phone application that teachers can use to access audio recordings in English to improve their pronunciation of words.
A special program that is now in its third year is the Professional Communication Skills for Leaders (PCLS) program, which is part of the Lower Mekong Initiative.  Through this program, Cambodian government officials receive intensive English-language training related to their work that will help them to participate in regional forums and workshops where English is the common language.  I want to thank the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for helping to coordinate this effort as well as the ten ministries that have nominated staff to attend the seminars.
Another innovative program is the Brunei-U.S. English-Language Enrichment Program for ASEAN, which is a joint initiative between the governments of Brunei Darussalam and the United States.  Now entering its third year, this five-year project aims to promote better regional integration through linguistic and cultural links.  The program is designed for officers, diplomats, and teacher trainers and aims to strengthen ASEAN as an institution as well as the individual states by promoting English language proficiency and associated skills. 
Last but not least, some of the most direct and impactful work is being done by Peace Corps Volunteers, who work out in less developed parts of the country.  Peace Corps Volunteers train teachers and teach English in upper and lower secondary schools and Regional Teacher Training Centers in 14 provinces.  Volunteers teach together with Cambodian counterparts, benefiting both the students participating in the class and the teacher.Through this approach Volunteers work to improve their counterpart teachers’ classroom management, teaching methodologies, language capacity, assessments techniques, and gender equity in the classroom.
All of these programs have one overarching goal: to increase Cambodia’s competitiveness.  Speaking English helps Cambodians to pursue an education, to get great jobs, and to give back to the community.  Most of all, it makes it possible for the Cambodian peopleto contribute to the global conversation and to have their voices heard by more people in more places.  By improving their abilities in English, young Cambodians in particular are setting themselves apart from their peers in the region and around the world and putting themselves in a position to drive Cambodia’s development.  
The United States will continue to partner with the Government of Cambodia, educational institutions, and the people of Cambodia to help make the dream of learning English a reality for more Cambodians than ever before.
Thank you for reading my column this week.  If you have questions for future columns please email me at AskAMBToddPP@state.gov. 


William E. Todd is U.S. Ambassador to the Kingdom of Cambodia

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Cambodians should also learn Vietnamese. In the future, Vietnamese will own a lot of plantation, factories in Cambodia. And there will be a lot of Vietnamese tourists.

-Drgunzet-

Anonymous said...

Teacher: Repeat after me.. I love Vietnamese people!

Anonymous said...

You folks don't have to love the Vietnamese. All you need to do is to acknowledge: Vietnamese are saviors and protectors for the Khmer.

All I require of the Khmer is to show respect and gratefulness.

-Drgunzet-

Anonymous said...

-Drgunzet- (Communist Vietnamese poster living in the U.S.),

You mentioned, "Vietnamese are saviors and protectors for the Khmer." Oh really?

There were hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese secret agents hiding in Khmer Rouges uniforms during and before the Killing Fields (1975-1979) who ended up killing millions of innocent and well-educated Khmer/Cambodian people including small children. Pol Pot had been toppled by secrete Vietnamese agents in Khmer Rouges uniforms who spoke, read and wrote Khmer language really well and fluently. There were several thousands of real Khmer Rouges soldiers (not killers) who were so busy to fight with the Vietnamese armies in Southern and Eastern Cambodia in order to get Khmer Kampuchea Krom/Southern Cambodia (today called Southern Vietnam) back. Your evil secret Vietcong/Vietnamese agents were busy to kill our innocent Khmer/Cambodian people who were very well educated and some of evil secret Vietcong/Vietnamese agents had robbed many things (like gold, valuable stuff, etc) from Phnom Penh to Vietnam/Srok Yuon during the Killing Fields times.

Pol Pot's China aids have been fallen into the secret Vietnamese agents from Hanoi and everything had been taken by those f**king secret Vietnamese agents from Hanoi.

Now, Pol Pot, his inner circles and his Khmer Rouges solders have been accused as the killers of their Khmer people as the scapegoats instead of the real killers who were the secret Vietnamese/Vietcong agents from Hanoi.

The goals of the Vietnamese master-minded killers (Hanoi leaders and Ho Chi Minh) were to terminated all innocent and very well-educated Khmer people before trying to take the entire country of Cambodia, by renaming the Khmer cities, provinces, town, roads, bridges, and so on.

Today or lately, have you heard some Vietnamese/Yuon folks said that Angkor Wat belongs to Yuon/Vietnam during the arguments (movies on YouTube somewhere), -Drgunzet-?

You need to prove that, communist Vietnamese poster -Drgunzet-.

Did you see that Khmer Rouges trial (KRT) has not been successful for over 20 years because of the Hanoi leaders' controls over Hun Sen and CPP government as the Hanoi's puppets?

Tell me anything that there are so many evidences about the dirty and dangerous games that your evil Yuon/Vietnamese leaders and folks like you who claim that you are "saviors and protectors for the Khmer." So far, you have been enjoying insulting unfortunate, voiceless, innocent Khmer victims and people.

You are so happy to see your evil Vietnamese/Yuon folks who succeed so far by being so smart to kill Khmer people, so smart to cheat and play dirty or dangerous games with Khmer leaders and kings, so smart to steal Khmer territory by encroaching, bringing the illegal Yuon/Vietnamese settlers or immigrants into Khmer territory as a human shield (Hanoi leaders did not care to hurt his own people), and beyond.

Vietnamese poster
-Drgunzet-, you need to open your eyes bigger and think carefully before you shoot or post your nonsense comments on here.

Khmer Yeurng

Anonymous said...

I love Yieknam