Early this month, we celebrated World Teacher’s Day, marking the anniversary of the 1996 signing of a United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (Unesco) document that provided a reference framework to address teachers’ rights and responsibilities on a global scale. This 2017 World Teachers’ Day also commemorated the 20th anniversary of another Unesco document to address the rights of teaching personnel at institutions of higher education.
The Joint Message from Unesco, International Labor Organization, United Nations Children’s Fund, United Nations Development Programme and Education International, conveyed a powerful statement by saying that being an empowered teacher, among others, means having “the professional autonomy to choose the most appropriate methods and approaches that enable more effective, inclusive and equitable education”, as well as “raising the status of teachers around the world in a way that honors and reflects the impact they have on the strength of society.”
Sometime in 1992 then Department of Education, Culture, and Sports required college faculty members to have a master’s degree as a minimum educational qualification for acquiring regular status. In 1994 the Commission on Higher Education upheld the requirement as contained in the revised manual of regulations for private schools. Sometime in 2013 when some University of the East college teachers challenged the validity of such regulation, the Supreme Court sustained the same and pointed out that “government regulation in this field of human activity is desirable for protecting not only the students but the public as well from ill-prepared teachers lacking in the required scientific or technical knowledge.”
In law schools, the Legal Education Board has recently required a certain percentage of law professors in a school to have a masters’ degree in law (Ll.M.) inasmuch as teaching theoretical foundation in law requires, among others, a higher form of pedagogical competence.
I have been an instructor since 1993 in a military-intelligence school and a professor since 1998 in several law schools. Save for the years when I worked abroad, I never stopped teaching, even when I was with the Bureau of Immigration and now with Philippine Airlines. Though teaching personnel is underpaid in relation to the hours spent vis-à-vis the financial package, I enjoy the quality interaction I get from the intellectual duels I encounter with some of the brightest students in law.
In a different field, scuba diving, I was under the tutelage of two instructors—Ross David and Gigi Santos. Both seasoned dive instructors are extremely competent and very passionate in this underwater hobby. Understandably, Ross and Gigi have different teaching styles. Ross is the doting, caring and Mother Goose type, while Gigi is the serious, straightforward, take-no-prisoners kind of mentor. Nonetheless, these two dive instructors leave a lasting imprint to the extent that their students, myself included, vividly remember all the experiences learned underwater.
Of all the law-school professors I had in Ateneo Law School, I will never forget Prof. Avelino “Baste” Sebastian Jr. He served as my inspiration to teach wills and succession, and even write a book about it. I find his teaching style, though unpredictable at best, very effective when it comes to making sure his students remember important points. He usually comes out as a “terror” professor for the most part but, in retrospect, I value his method, as it instills discipline among his students. During my masters’ program in law, my best professor was Prof. Charles Whitebread, who was coincidentally teaching a similar subject (gifts, wills and trusts). I try to imitate both of their teaching techniques as much as I venerate their respective extraordinary technical competence. Though I have not seen Prof. Baste for quite some time now, his teaching legacy is still felt in the Ateneo Law School, hopefully through others like me who were once under him.
There is a myriad of teaching methods that I have witnessed in the military academy and in professional schools. At the end of each semester, whenever I have the chance to share to my students my thoughts on teaching law, I always tell them that my presence within the four walls of the classroom is not to teach, but to train; not to torture, but to inspire; not to educate, but to help them learn. And, the most effective way to train, inspire and facilitate the learning process is to maximize teacher-student interaction, depending on the subject and the audience. After all, whether the topic is as technical as scuba diving or military surveillance, the so-called experts in the subject will still have to learn from their students—one way or another.
In the Bible, Proverbs 1:4 tells us, “A wise man will hear and increase in learning. And a man of understanding will acquire wise counsel”. For teachers, the moment they stop learning is the moment they stop caring for themselves and for their students. In my case, I never stopped teaching simply because I refuse to stop learning.
For questions and comments, please e-mail me at sbmison@gmail.com.