A Valued Teacher

(Minghui.org) I’m a primary school teacher, and I started practicing Falun Dafa in 1997, when I was in my late 20s. Before I practiced, I suffered from a number of health problems including high blood pressure and breast hyperplasia. After I started practicing Falun Dafa, all my health problems disappeared. I eventually became the only elected director in the school and colleagues respected me and thought well of my teaching skills.

When Jiang Zemin (former Chinese Communist Party leader and head of state) launched the persecution of Falun Dafa on July 20, 1999, I was surprised and thought, “This is such a wonderful practice. Why aren’t we allowed to do it?” Two days later, I headed to Beijing with other practitioners to appeal for justice for Falun Dafa. When I returned, the school principal criticized me during a meeting attended by the entire staff. In the following years, whenever “sensitive dates” came, I was under house arrest at school, and my salary and bonus were withheld.

In July and August of 2022, I was sent to a forced labor camp for brainwashing. I thought, “No matter how the school treats me, I should always remember that I’m a Falun Dafa practitioner and I do my job well according to the standards of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance.” As a result of my hard work and dedication to my job, at the end of each year, I always received a lot of votes for “Advanced Worker.” The school leadership never recommended me to the Education Bureau for a promotion for fear of criticism from their superiors because I practiced Falun Dafa.

Due to my hard work and commitment, I was promoted to be the grade leader in September 2002. While endeavoring to improve my professional abilities, I also helped young teachers learn how to manage their classes and teach effectively. I always communicated with other teachers in a constructive and peaceful manner in the coordination of various tasks in our grade group, so I was often praised by school leaders.

In 2008, there was a big shakeup in the school leadership in our district and a new principal was transferred to our school. Not long after, the principal and director of the original Academic Affairs Office were either promoted or transferred to other schools, leaving us with only two young people who were promoted to leadership positions only two or three months earlier.

The new principal talked with staff members and wanted to find a teacher who was capable of handling the comprehensive teaching management, head the Academic Affairs Office, be the new director, and be responsible for the overall educational direction of the school. A veteran teacher recommended me.

After a vote by leaders representing staff in various teaching and research groups in the school as well as the school leadership, I was elected unanimously. The principal said that he would report it to the Education Bureau to promote me to the position of vice principal. I became the only elected director in the school and served as such until I retired in 2021.

“I Cannot Accept Such a Certificate”

One day, not long after I became the director of the Academic Affairs Office, the school principal called me to his office, and told me that someone called the Education Bureau and said our school promoted a Falun Gong practitioner to director.

I didn’t want to put more pressure on the new principal so I offered to resign. To my surprise, he said, “I don’t care about this. What are you afraid of?” I decided to continue as director. However, he never mentioned recommending me to be promoted to vice principal again.

As I am a Falun Dafa practitioner, I always work very hard at my job. Master also gave me much wisdom along the way, and I developed a lot of abilities in teaching, management, and research activities. The school principal appreciated my character and leadership skills, and a number of junior directors I trained were promoted to vice principals and later became my superiors. The principal always felt that I had not been treated fairly and wanted to make up for it by helping me get promoted to a senior professional title.

One day, after I finished my report and sent it to the principal, he called a municipal teaching and research officer over and said that he felt bad because he could not promote me to vice-principal. He said he wanted to help me obtain a senior professional title and asked the officer to help obtain a municipal-level certificate for me, a qualification requirement for a senior professional title.

For an everyday person, this was a great favor because with such a title, one would receive an increase of several hundred yuan in salary, and the school principal was helping with it personally.

However, I am a practitioner and I must conduct myself by the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance no matter the circumstances. So I decided to write a letter to the school principal and explain why I had to decline his kind offer. I also planned to ((clarify the truth}} about Falun Dafa.

In the letter, I expressed my gratitude to him for his offer of help, and then gave two reasons why I declined it. I said that Falun Dafa promotes Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance and our Master told us to always think about others no matter the circumstances. If you, the school principal asked an officer to get me a fake certificate, it would be tantamount to fraud. I couldn’t let you and the officer take responsibility for my personal gain. My conscience could not live with it. Secondly, even though such a certificate would be very beneficial to me, if I did not obtain it through my own efforts, it would be an act against the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance.

Guided by the Fa (teachings), I politely declined the principal’s offer. Dafa purified my heart, and Master taught me to live my life by thinking of others first.

Treat Everyone with Kindness and Righteous Thoughts

In 2009, six students were temporarily assigned to a branch campus of our school due to strict requirements and inspections by the Education Bureau. Their parents requested that one of the school’s best teachers be assigned to teach them. In order to appease the parents, the school principal assigned me to take on the job, and the school also put up big banners in the community and at the school gate, with words: “Provincial Key Teacher --- to Teach First Grade at Our Branch Campus.”

Besides the six children from the city, there were more than twenty other children from families in which the parents worked odd jobs or ran small businesses, such as selling fruits or vegetables, roasting sweet potatoes, or selling pancakes. The parents were mostly uneducated and couldn’t help their children. They had to work very hard and had little time to take care of their children, who had poor communication skills and limited knowledge as they did not had not receive a preschool education. They also looked very untidy, very different from the children I normally taught.

I had to start from scratch by teaching them how to dress properly, how to sharpen their pencils, how to pack their school bags, and how to do their homework. I also taught them how to develop good habits in daily life and in their school work and encouraged them to form good reading habits.

These children were very simple and honest. They listened to me and tried hard to meet the requirements I set for them.

It was very obvious that I couldn’t rely on their parents to help them, so I decided I would treat them loving kindness and patience. I read books with them, helped them with their homework, and waited for their parents to pick them up.

The children worked very hard too, and in the final examination, this class was ranked top alongside the other classes at the main school.

One thing happened that I’ll never forget. On Christmas Eve, sixteen students each brought a Christmas gift for me – an apple (which means peace fruit in Chinese). I washed them, cut each in half, and shared with the whole class. When I saw my students, each holding half an apple and quietly enjoying the loving kindness from their teacher, a form of kindness I cultivated because of Dafa, I was touched by the wonderful feeling.

Substituting for a Class

In 2010, a sixth-grade teacher went on maternity leave and the principal asked me to take over the class as their Chinese teacher and head teacher. The class ranked last among four classes and I found the students were not proficient in the Chinese language.

In view of the situation of the children in class, I started by teaching the students how to preview their lessons and focused on improving their basic vocabulary skills. I focused on teaching them how to learn, develope their ability to learn on their own, and improve their comprehension ability and communication skills. I also showed them how to make good use of their morning reading and lunch-time writing times to improve their self-study abilities. This balanced teaching approach benefited both talented students and those with learning difficulties, and gave all the students confidence and motivation to do well in their studies.

At one parent meeting, I spent two hours giving them pointers on how to educate their children and how they could cooperate with the teacher in effectively managing the children. Later, I noticed a big change in the children.

In the midterm exam, 42 out of 60 students scored 90 points or above. When parents saw their children’s rapid improvement, they were extremely grateful for my dedication and hard work. In less than one semester, the Chinese language score of my class went from the bottom to the top for the entire grade.

One student had a poor foundation in all subjects, with a score of only 20 out of 100 in Chinese. He often left a lot of blank spaces when he took notes. He had no confidence, and his parents thought he was hopeless.

He was only a sixth grader and barely started his life journey. “I must help him,” I thought. I talked with his parents many times and recommended some books to them on how to educate children and encouraged them to help him.

In school, I patiently coached the student with no prejudice or criticism, and I praised him whenever he made the tiniest improvement. He gradually gained some self-confidence and was motivated to learn. Even his eyes were brighter and he began to show enthusiasm in learning. His scores also improved and after the final examination his score was 70 out of 100.

To my great surprise, a few years later, he came to see me in my office to tell me that after he graduated from junior middle school, he transferred to a technical secondary school and became dorm supervisor. He was very happy with the subject he chose and optimistic about the future. We chatted for a long time and seeing his bright and confident face, I felt so happy for him. Being a teacher was so worthwhile!

Usually, students who had difficulty learning rarely visited their teacher after they graduate. He overcame his inferiority complex. His goal in life was not about whether he attended a good college or ended up with a good job. His life will be beautiful if he holds a bright and positive attitude towards the future.

Dafa taught me how to be a good person, a person who thinks of others, and a teacher needed by the students.

The happiest thing in my life is that I obtained Dafa. I’m deeply grateful to Master for caring so much for us practitioners. I’m determined to cultivate diligently, save more people, and return to my true home with Master.