Sothea – Field Director, Srayang Learning Center
I started working for PLF in 2015. Ponheary’s brother is an old friend of mine and I got to know her and Lori too. Whey they were first setting up the project at Srayang, they asked me if I could go to oversee it. I said yes and resigned from Cambodian Mine Action Center (CMAC) where I had been working for more than 20 years.
When I first went to Preah Vihear, I was the only Field Director there so I was responsible for both Koh Ker and Romchek village primary schools, and what was then the dorm at Srayang. At that time, the dorm sheltered around 30 students from the villages – the boys in one house and the girls in another – so that they could attend Srayang secondary school after graduating Grade 6. We had a small computer lab as well as a classroom where I taught English which doubled as the eating hall. The whole site ran on only solar power as there was no city electricity.
Sothea with the 2017 Srayang dorm intake
During the Covid school closures of 2020, we had to send the students back to their villages and close the dorm. We had already been planning how to convert the dorm into a learning center so that we could enable a greater number of students to come from the village primaries, and so during the closures we worked on that transition. Now, we transport the kids from their villages in big trucks every day so that they can attend government school in the morning, then we provide lunch, English classes, workshops, computer and remedial classes and other activities in order to make sure that they can catch up what they had lost during the Covid time.
Now my position is solely SLC Field Director, responsible for the general management at the center, since it is so much bigger. In 2023 we added a new classroom block to accommodate the increase in students coming through, as the current student count is now over 100. We also expanded the computer lab to host more students to learn their IT lessons.
Sothea welcoming the new – and biggest ever – Grade 7 intake for the 2023-24 school year
I am very happy to see how the center has expanded in recent years, with more and more students passing through to Grade 7 from their primary schools. The aspect I love most about my job is teaching English to the young middle and high school students, because I love teaching and helping others in need, especially those students who need advice about further education.
For me, my school time was hard as I did not have any school supplies to use in the class. Like many other students in that hard time, I had to walk a long distance to travel to the middle school which was located far from where I lived. I remember the communist government did not allow the students to learn western languages such as French or English. I used to learn French language while I was in middle school but the teacher asked the kids to keep it a secret so as not to leak it to the local authorities.
In summary, life was hard as well as the education, and I could only finish Grade 7 – which in 1986 was equal to current Grade 9. This is why I feel happy when I see our students can achieve good grades at school, and that Grade 12 students can now pass their national exam in Srayang and go on to university to pursue their dream careers.
Education plays a crucial role in the nation’s development. That is why I am motivating students to go to school and study hard in order to make their future brighter and help to develop our country, Cambodia.
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