Primary school | Pan Paung, Myanmar
Olympus OM-2N | Kodak Plus-X
There are no government schools in Chin State. These villages pool their resources—along with donations from outsiders—and build their own schools, hiring teachers from Mrauk U. Generally these young teachers are not doing this for purely altruistic reasons, but due to their own difficulty in finding work at a government school back home. These teachers were just 21, 22, and 25 years old; and as the 21-year-old held the only university degree in the group, she was in charge.
The small one-room school was split into classes, duties shared by the three teachers. The best performer of the older students helped teach the young ones. While teaching is never easy, these three had a pretty good setup...not sure if they were actually paid less than teachers who deal with more students alone, though.
