Berkley Center

Background: In summer 2013 as part of the Education and Social Justice Project, undergraduate student Annie Dale interviewed Hom Teour, the director of Don Bosco Battambang, a primary school in Battambang, Cambodia. In this interview (conducted via translator), Hom discusses Don Bosco, a worldwide school network run by Silesian priests; how his school functions; and the challenges and joys his role entails.

What is your job title and what do you do every day?

I am the director of the Don Bosco School.

What grades does the Don Bosco School serve?

Don Bosco in Battambang serves grades one through three. It is a primary school.

And who supports the school?

We have some support from the government and other support from NGOs and people who want to help. Father Kike [Enrique Figaredo, S.J.] helps us a lot.

But this is not a government school?

No, but they are the same—the classes, the teachers are all from the government, but we don’t take the teachers from their government schools. We only have them in the morning, and in the afternoon, they go back to teach at the government schools.

Can you tell me a little bit about the Don Bosco organization?

There are 132 Don Bosco schools around the world and about 5 in Cambodia. Don Bosco is run by the Silesian priests of Don Bosco.

Can you tell me what else the Don Bosco organization does besides run this school?

We also work with children in the village that cannot access our schools. Many children in the village have to go to a government-run school but do not have enough money. We give them money so that they can go to school or so they can have food. For them, it would be very difficult to come to Don Bosco because it is very far, and it would be very difficult to get here.

And how do you select the children that do get to study here?

There are four things we consider. First, they have to be seven years old to go to grade one. We want to encourage them to learn from grade one. The second is that they have to be the poorest children. These are children from the brick factories and the paddy fields. We also accept orphans or families who have too many children. We also accept the children whose parents have left them and have to live with a grandmother or a stranger.

Do you have relationships with the children’s families?

Yes, of course. Most of the teachers here know the families.

Are the children’s parents supportive of them going to school here?

When you ask me that question, it is very hard. Most of the children come from the factories or the paddy field, and they work very hard, like slaves. They get only one dollar per day for twelve hours of work. They work all the time and do not have time to study. They work with their family to support the family. Don Bosco tries to take all of the children out of those situations. We will work with the owner of the brick company and try to build a good relationship with them to ask the brick factory owner to accept that the students should go to school. Then we try to build trust with the parents to help them understand the children’s future and let them accept the children coming to school.

Did the parents get an education?

No, most of them do not have an education.

So you have to talk to the parents about the future?

Yes, we talk about the future and also about the rules and the requirements of Don Bosco. Now at Don Bosco we supply food for the children, school uniforms, study materials, and also health care. So when you put it like that, the parents will accept. No need to pay any money. Don Bosco does not get money from the parents. We don’t.

Do any of the children here drop out before they finish through grade six?

Yes, some of them. Every year we have children drop out of school because they follow their family to go work in Thailand. Every year we lose our children. The parents do not care about the children; they just want the food. So they go to Thailand, and the children have to go with them so they can have some place to live. You can see in the Don Bosco education we support only the poor families because we care about the situation of the children—even if the parents don’t care. But we work very hard. We also have workers that follow up with the children. We go to the family and ask, “Why was your child absent?” We send the worker to visit the families. Some days they visit, but the family has already taken off for Thailand. But we don’t only go to visit the students who are absent; we also go see the families of the very good students, the very clever students. We also visit them to tell the parents that their child is very good and to motivate them to help their children. Then they will push them more to come to school. We say, “Your child is very smart and very clever. They are number one in school and in their class.” We tell them this. And we don’t have much money to give, but we have our heart.

If the children did not have the opportunity to attend Don Bosco, where would they be? What would they be doing?

The children would be with their families in the village. There are some government schools there, but the children cannot study there because they want to help their parents work. They need to get some money and support their family. In the government schools, they need to pay by themselves for the uniforms, books, and classes. But at Don Bosco, there is no need. That is why they have the opportunity to study here—because they don’t need to spend money. Some of the families go to Thailand or to other provinces to find money. They just want money. If they want a job in Cambodia, they can find it. But they don’t want the jobs in Cambodia because they want more money. Sometimes we try to help them, but then they come to the office and shout at us. Some of the children get married very early.

Even if the children don’t have their parents’ support, do they like to come to school and learn? Or would they rather be at home helping their family?

Of course they like to come to school because every morning they get breakfast and lunch. Here there are so many places to play, and they have friends. So maybe for the first few months it is hard for the children, but after that they know each other and are playing and are happy to come to school.

What is the hardest part of your job?

The hardest part is seeing the children drop out. We have a difficult time breaking those relationships. My biggest concern is that they will drop out because the parents will take them with them when they leave Battambang, and the children will not get an education. It is also very hard to build a relationship with the parents of the children. We first tried to go out and build a relationship and get them to understand the future and what we offer at Don Bosco. We want them to let their children do something special, but some do not want to talk. They have no knowledge and no ideas about education. They only want money. Tomorrow is money. They only want money for today. “Today I will work so I can eat. Tomorrow I will work so I can eat.” They don’t think about the future. Later on, they get drunk with alcohol and just complain to the children. So the children get upset and are brokenhearted. The children then do not want to come and just want to go with their family to get more money. This is what I worry about every day. There is also a lot of materialism. They only want to focus on materials and want to buy something new; they don’t want to focus on education. It is hard.

So what is your goal for Don Bosco? What would be a goal or an aspiration?

I have a big dream that we will increase the number of students in the future. My other dream is that I believe that our children will have a good job in the future. Don Bosco teaches our children to have respect and to be disciplined. We try to help them understand their own life. It is my dream that most of them will have a better future. I hope they will find a good job and that they will come back to Don Bosco to help us, to teach us, to teach a new generation. I believe they will come. Some of my teachers here were students, and now they are teachers here. This guy was a student here. He could have gotten a job at a big company and made a lot of money, but he came here.

If you had more money to put into this school, what would you use it for?

I would use it first to make a better quality education for the children. I would also use it for sports. I love sports and education. We cannot learn without sports, and we cannot play sports without learning. That kind of thing is something I want to open. If you have more sports, you can imagine… the students love sports! So they will come to school. You need to give them motivation, and you have to let them have competition with one other. So they win or they lose, but they still come to play. They have sports to play, food to eat, school to study, and the materials to use, so they will come. If I had money, I would do this.