Wednesday 5 December 2007

The students we teach: Leaders of tomorrow






I have been a clinical ophthalmic lecturer for the last five years, and have seen several students pass through my classes; some very keen, hard working and others very lazy- just aiming for the paper/qualification. Of most interesting apart from student doctors and post graduate students at the College of medicine in Blantyre, Malawi; are the diploma ophthalmic students from all over Africa who come for one year training at the SADC Ophthalmic training school in Lilongwe, Malawi.
I keep on wondering what happens to them after they graduate and return back to their home countries. Are they successful in their career? Do they get promoted in their jobs?
During my trips/visits to neighboring counties I have met in Uganda, Kenya, Mozambique past students who trained in Malawi during the last five years.
And recently I met one of my past students in London at the London school of Hygiene and Tropical medicine who used a diploma qualification obtained from Malawi to gain entry for a degree programme .I was very proud of myself as this bright colleague( Yes he was no longer my student) was telling everybody that I taught him.
I am sure there are many other graduates out there who say good things about what I contributed to their life; but I am also very thankful to the many teachers out there that taught me to be a doctor. Then I did not understand what it was meant by saying that “students of today are the future teachers of tomorrow”.
Till then the journey of knowledge transfer continues. These pictures of the students I have taught are an obvious testimony.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Well Dr KK. Had you told us about the graduation - I'm sure we would have tried our best to reschedule/deligate other commitments or at least one of us would have been there with you...