How Hard I Had To Fight For Education?

Every time I walk out of my house with the car key, Oliver (my grandson) says: “Grandpa is going to school”. His statement makes me happy because I want him to learn that education is very important. He is 28 months old now and will be attending pre-school in two more months. On his birthday, his uncles and aunt had opened a bank account reserved for his future school expenses. His educational road is well prepared and wide open for him to walk on.

Quite different than what are prepared for Oliver, I spent my preschool year under the French colonial rural education system. In this system, all children (regardless of age differences) were put in one classroom, run by an unqualified teacher. The teachers are unprepared for their job and unfamiliar with the social-cultural environment (Cogan, 1982). Many times I had to take my teacher’s role to assist other students after the teacher had spent fifteen minutes in class. As the teachers began to become more effective after some experience and practice, they are moved to the cities and placed in the urban schooling system where they can find more money and prestige (Cogan, 1982).

At four years old I begun to expose to the urban schooling system in the orphanages, taught by the nuns who were poorly trained. When I return home with my mother, I was eight years old and still being placed at the bottom level of elementary classes of the French colonial system (equivalent to our first grade). Two years later and with the division of my native country I followed my mother to move to the South. During the first two years in the South, I could not go to school because of the political and military struggling between the newly formed government and the colonial France.

The struggle ended in 1956 with the termination of French involvement in Vietnam and the conquering of the new government over several groups who wanted to remain the relationship with the colony. The new educational system, nevertheless, was still heavily linked to the colonial past: Most children went only to primary school, if they go to school at all. Admission to secondary schools is reserved for those who either do very well at the primary level or have relationship to the educational authorities (Cogan, 1982).

With these interruptions, I could not finish my elementary school until I became twelve years old. At this level and because I belong to a poor family, I wasn’t accepted into public high school nor did I have money to pay for tuition at the private school. Luckily I was recruited by a priest who tried to find children who wanted to learn to be a monk in a monastery. I spent four years there, in the jungle learning mostly French and Latin (four hours a day) and very little literature, math, social studies. At seventeen I returned to the city and still being a ninth grader.

After this year, I was adopted by a blind man who was the landlord of my rental house. He took me to a newly opened government school and claimed that I’m his son. He begged the officials for my admission. I skipped tenth grades was jammed in a 190 students eleventh class. The school was six miles away from my home. My only transportation was an old bicycle which was flattened after every mile. I had to use hand pump to inflate the tube. At the end of that year I was one of the nine students who passed the very difficult examination which determines the eligibility to be accepted into the twelve grades. Eleventh grade was the highest class that this school could provide. I had no choice but to look for a private school where I ran out of money for tuition after 3 months. I was kicked out of the class and had to sit at the door listening to the instructions. This did not last long and I was chased away. Luckily, one of the class-mate whose father was transferred to the central region needs a place to stay. I asked him to share my place with condition that he would repeat to me what he learned in class. The result was that, at the end of the school year, I passed the most difficult examination of the entire high school program (my friend failed). With this passage I could register at any college and my life was promised a brighter future.


Unfortunately, after six months in college, I had to cease my education and started to work so I could support my family. Later I was drafted to the Vietnamese marines and was participating in the war. When I migrated to the United States, I’d tried several times but wasn’t able to finish my dreamed education due to the burden of work. Now that I’m retired I want to continue my dream, not for my career but for building up my knowledge in order to be able to help children who are walking on the same road that I’ve gone through.

Citation:

Cogan, J. J. (1982). Education and development in the third world. Educational Leadership, 39(6), 430. Retrieved on April 28, 2011from EBSCOhost.