Written by Daanysh Habiel
(PHOTO: Daanysh Habiel)
The alarm of her phone lets out a resounding sound that could wake the whole neighbourhood up. She stretches out her hand to reach for her phone in the partial darkness of her room. As she grabs her phone, she turns the alarm off, and she gets up to prepare for her day. 5:30 a.m. – the time that she wakes up everyday to prepare for work. This may seem like a mundane routine for most, but for 39-year-old Mdm. Siti Hadzzier Binte Hamzah, it is something that she looks forward to every day.
Mdm. Hadzzier works as a full-time teacher at Yio Chu Kang Primary School, teaching both English and Mathematics to lower primary students. She had always dreamed of becoming a teacher since she was a little girl. Although some would say that being a teacher is just a job for them, she heard a higher calling.
“I really wanted to pursue my dream of being a teacher to help all these neglected children. Children who come from diverse backgrounds whereby their parents were divorced, or children who were living with their grandparents.”, she said as she sips on her cup of hot latte.
As delighted as she is now, the cheerful Mdm. Hadzzier has had her own share of struggles. Before becoming a teacher, it was not all rainbows and sunshine for her. She graduated with a Diploma in Communications in 2009 when Singapore’s economy was terribly hit due to the Great Recession. Additionally, she had to take care of two growing children who were five-and six-years-old.
“I couldn’t find a job that was related to the diploma that I completed. It took me more than half a year to apply for jobs. I went to many different interviews but none responded to me. Eventually, I got a job as an immigration officer with the Ministry of Home Affairs. The job was more for surviving as I had very young children at that time.”, she recalls as she breathed a sigh of relief.
Working as an immigration officer, she had to work in shifts which in turn affected her sleeping hours. Additionally, the environment of her workplace was not ideal for her health at all. Constantly breathing in thick smoke emitted from the exhaust of vehicles as she stamps the passports of travellers damaged her health overtime. One particular experience that occurred left a lasting impression on her.
“I did not have any difficulties with my first and second pregnancies because I wasn’t working as an ICA officer yet but for my third pregnancy, I had a really difficult pregnancy. I can say that it was contributed by the environment that I was working in and I was hospitalised on many different occasions.”, she reminisces as she takes another sip of her hot latte. After giving birth to her youngest daughter, Mdm. Hadzzier knew that she did not want to work as an immigration officer any longer and decided to pursue her dream of becoming a teacher.
The path towards becoming a teacher was not as easy as she thought it might have been. Mdm. Hadzzier applied to the National Institute of Education (NIE) four times after getting rejected on three of those occasions. After finally getting accepted in the fourth attempt, she felt that her determination paid off and her prayers were answered. However, facing multiple rejections was only the beginning.
“When I got into NIE, it was not even to be a teacher, it was to be a contract teacher. To be a teacher, you need to be under contract for one year with the school before you can get a place in NIE. So for that one year, I was without training. Untrained, I had to learn everything from scratch and that’s where I faced the realities of what being a teacher is.”, she explained.
During her stint as a contract teacher, she realised that her dreams came true. Her dreams of helping neglected children in schools. She encountered many different students with bizarre personalities – each individual unique in their own way.
Mdm. Hadzzier is who she is today because of her unwavering passion to serve and support these neglected children.
“Knowing that the parents and grandparents of these underprivileged children reach out to you and thanking you for taking care of their children and being there for them is the most fulfilling thing of being a teacher.”, she said as she finishes her cup of latte and smiles.
