Extra Credit : Interview

Interviewee: Wesley Ueunten

Interviewer: Shin Shan Cho

Location: San Francisco State University

Date: 03 May 2018

Interview

• Tell me about your education in the past when you were growing up

I grew up in Hawaii. My education system was really bad because I think my area where I live. Not that we are poor, my parents are in middle class. But where I grew up, we(our school) didn’t have many resources. When I hit to sixth or seventh grade, we didn’t learn many new things. For music class, we had to share one trumpets with four or five people. Yeah, we didn’t have many resources. Textbooks are the same for like ten or fifteen years. That’s how bad it was. So when I went to Highschool, I went to private school. I was kinda behind compared with others. When I went to college, I was still behind compared to students who went to here in mainland.

• Do you think the education in US is good?

I would say it is inconsistent because the place when I grew up, it’s bad but some places; even in Hawaii, there are really good public school from beginning to the end. The education in here is so much inequality. So if you have money, you can go to private school. The education system is not that great but it is getting worse and worse. So people who have money, they sent their children to private school. So all the good students go to private school. Some people who couldn’t afford education for their children and bad students go to public school. So the inequality of education is growing in Hawaii.

• Do you know anything about education in developing countries especially in Asia?

I’m not familiar but I am wondering if it will have some similarities. Like parents who have money, they send their children to private school. Parents who don’t have money, their children stay in public school. In Japan, there’s a lot propaganda passed down to the education. “ Be loyal to your country” Even my education system in the past was bad, we didn’t have to memorize things and not that much propaganda like in your old school. Memorize Memorize and I think there’s connection between getting student to memorize uncritically meaning you just memorize and you don’t think. Once the students learn without thinking critically, which means you just feed them anything you want. I am lucky that it didn’t happen to me.

• What are the educational differences between US and Asia countries?

I would say it will be still have educational inequality between this two countries.

• Do you know anything about Myanmar?

I know about there has large amount of Chinese population. It controlled by military very a long time; repressive government even with Aung San Suu Kyi. Many different minorities within country; like small different languages. But I don’t really know that much about Myanmar.

• In general, what do you think about what government should invest more money on? Education, medical, government, etc?

Definitely on medical and education.

• What I have research in Myanmar education, teacher get paid very little compared with other countries especially in US. Do you think Myanmar Government should increase the salary for teachers and why?

Wow, that’s really surprising for me. Even though some people like me who passionate to teach and this career doesn’t give me some amount of money, I would be stressed out because I would think about money first in order to survive my living. It sounds kinda selfish haha. But I strongly suggest to Myanmar Government that they really should increase salary for teachers because being teacher is part of learning process like students will learn through their experiences of course and also acquire informations for teachers is important too.

• How do you think or feel about Myanmar either in the history or current time? What should Myanmar change in any other ways that you could think about?

Based on what I know, Burmese people believe in Buddhism and I don’t get why the government ruled by military which means full of anger and other stuff. And I feel like they should change the rule of the government.