By Myint Zan

 

Teacher homage ceremonies: unique to Burma/Myanmar?

THE ‘teacher homage ceremony’ by the 8^th batch BA (Law), LLB students of the teachers who taught this batch took place on 25 October 2025. Organizers (a few of my former classmates) have invited me to the ceremony. As a social obligation, I have told the organizers that I attended the ceremony and I also contributed to it.

 

The late history and international relations teacher, Dr Khin Maung Nyunt, stated in one of his articles that the teacher homage ceremony is unique to Burma/Myanmar. I do not know whether that claim is true or not. Do our neighbouring Buddhist countries, Thailand, Cambodia, and Sri Lanka, have teacher homage ceremonies or not?

 

Sayagyi (historian) Dr Than Tun’s almost contrarian view of homage ceremonies?

Somewhat in contrast to Dr Khin Maung Nyunt, the late historian Dr Than Tun (6 April 1923- 30 November 2005) once apparently or at least allegedly stated that such ‘homage ceremonies’ are somewhat like ‘bribery’. I should add that (if Sayagyi Dr Than Tun had really stated that) the homage ceremonies are not quite ‘bribery’ ceremonies for the former students have graduated years or even a few decades ago. They cannot bribe their former teachers for the pass rates or good grades. Still, in a sense, I got what Sayagyi Dr Than Tun was ‘coming from’ to revert to the colloquial.

 

My University teachers, almost by accident or by choice?

For me personally, it is almost by accident, so to speak, that those who taught me in my five years at the BA, LLB course. As I have written in a previous article IF I have chosen English major in its inaugural English major course THEN my teachers would have been the late Sayagyi Dr Myo Min (English Professor), the late Say­amagyi Daw Thein Nyunt (English Professor), the late Sayagyi Dr Khin Maung Nyunt referred to above and the late Saya Maung Khin Min (Danubyu) who Lectured Burmese to the inaugural English and subsequent three or four batches of the English majors. Alas, I was never their former student and only met Saya Maung Khin Min (Danubyu) and briefly Dr Khin Maung Nyunt. I have learned a lot from Saya Maung Khin Min’s books, though I never had the chance to pay my respects and obeisance (kadaw). I should add that none of my 150 law freshers would have been eligible for the English major, as indeed I was certainly eligible to do so. And to be fair, all of the 17 to 20 English majors who enrolled in the inaugural course of 1970 would have been eligible to take law at the Rangoon Arts and Science University (RASU).

 

The year 2024 was the 50th anniversary of the inaugural English major course. I do not know whether the 1974 BA (English) graduate had a reunion and teacher homage ceremonies on the 50th anniversary of their graduation in 2024. The year 2025 is also the 50th anniversary of the 8th batch of BA, LLB graduates. Hence, the teacher homage ceremony and lunch, as well as dinner later that night on 25 October 2025, is the 50th anniversary of our graduation and also in a sense ‘reunion’ of the remaining, so to speak, classmates and teachers.

 

Teaching evaluations: A few of my experiences as a University student and University teacher

 

From my recall, I had my first chance to evaluate a teacher at the University of Michigan Law School in the Winter 1982 term. Near the end of the course on Legal Philosophy, Professor Philip Soper asked the students to fill out an evaluation form, which I filled in. I cannot recall whether or not there were other courses which asked students to do ‘evaluation forms’ at Michigan Law School.

 

Fast forward to the 1990s. I taught at the University of Malaya Law Faculty and the Law Faculty of Universiti Kebangsaan Malay­sia (National University of Malaysia) Law Faculty from July 1990 to May 1994. Students in both Law Faculties were not required to fill out evaluation forms. Then from November 1994 to February 1997, I taught at the University of New England in Armidale, New South Wales, Australia. There, the students in all the courses that I taught were, at their option, filled out evaluation forms.

 

In one course, Introduction to Business Law or Law and Soci­ety, one student wrote of my teaching: ‘Lecturer illiterate and does not speak English’. But in a different course, ‘Human Rights’ in the same University, another student wrote in answer to the question in the evaluation form, ‘How could this course be improved? ‘This course does not need any improvement. It is the best course that I have taken.’ Two very different student evaluations in two different courses at the same University!

 

Fast forward to the year 2018 at the University of Mandalay De­partment of Law. I gave a guest Lecture on a topic which intersects with both international law and jurisprudence. A few foreigners who do not understand Burmese, including a Visiting Professor from the United States, attended my guest Lectures. Although there were only 3 or four foreigners who did not understand the Myanmar language, I gave my Lecture ‘bilingually’. I use PowerPoint notes in English. After my Lecture, the American professor told me that my Lecture/ talk was one of the best Lectures he had heard in the past ten years.

 

I shifted from the University of New England in Armidale to Deakin University in Burwood, Victoria, Australia. One of the classes I taught was at night. It started around 7 pm and it finished around 9 pm. Ordinarily, the procedure to distribute the evaluation sheets/ forms was that the Faculty office staff would bring the forms and distribute them in class immediately before the Lecture ended, and later they would collect and keep them. Because my classes were held at night, the staff said they did not want to stay late, so he evaluation forms were mailed to them and not distributed in person. Only those students who had a grudge against me apparently filled the form. Out of a class of 100 or more, only about ten filled the forms, and most of them are negative. There is a difference in distributing and collecting forms, which affected me negatively, I assert.

 

ALL student evaluation forms in all Universities where I have taught were kept (in secrecy) and were delivered to the Lecturer only AFTER the exams were over and AFTER both the Final and Supplementary exam results were issued. This is so in ALL student evaluations of teachers that I have experienced post-1993 in Univer­sities in Australia, the South Pacific, the United States and Malaysia. This is to protect the students from being victimized by the disgrun­tled teachers. ALL the student evaluations were done anonymously. Students were specifically instructed NOT to write their names and student numbers in student forms, which they have to fill in their own handwriting. And the evaluation forms were delivered to the lecturers after all the exams were over.

 

By early 2007, when I joined Multimedia University in Malacca, Malaysia, the students’ evaluation forms were no longer pen and pa­per stuff (so to speak). By the time the semester teaching ended and before the students sat for their exam, emails were sent to them to access the website and fill in the evaluation forms online (only). They were assured that it would be anonymous and they would be sent to the respective Lecturers only after both the Final and Supplementary exams are over and the results are released. Still, a few of my students expressed their concern that some lecturers might know who they are if they write negative and even slightly critical comments. I showed (a few of them) computer-generated forms of evaluations of my courses. No names or roll numbers are mentioned. But a few students told me that one particular lecturer scolded them in class about their negative comments. Some law courses are two-semester courses. After Part I of a particular Law subject is finished in the second semester, usually the same lecturer teaches Part II of the course. Hence, those lecturers who are displeased by the negative comments they received took it out and threatened (so to speak) with ‘vengeance’ in the next exam.

 

Anonymous nature of student evaluations of teachers

At Multimedia University in Malaysia, the students have to evaluate anonymously online, and if the number of student partic­ipants exceeds 50 per cent of the enrolled students, the evaluation is considered ‘valid’. Otherwise, it is not. In Burma/Myanmar, since about 1964, teachers graded their students’ from Grade 1 to Grade 5. Grade 1 being the lowest and Grade 5 being the best. In MMU, the students evaluate teachers from Grade 1 to Grade 5. If the student evaluations (which meet the 50 per cent participation requirement) go below Grade 3, then a ‘please explain’ or ‘reminder letter’ is sent to the particular lecturer by the respective office. If student evaluations reach ‘Grade’ 4.5 and above out of 5, then a compliments letter signed by the President of the University is sent to the Lecture. A Certificate of Merit is issued. And if I recall correctly, those 4.5/5 ‘star teachers from all Faculties were invited for dinner to honour them. In my ten-year stint at Multimedia University, I received a single certificate for ‘excellent teaching’ and attended a dinner together with others who received Grade 4.5/5 and above.

 

I was also for five weeks a Visiting Professor at West Virginia University (WVU) College of Law in the United States for about five weeks in September 2009. I made the mistake of devising my own ‘student evaluation forms’ and distributed them to the class of about 30 students. I taught international human rights law for about six hours a week for about five weeks at WVU College of Law. I distributed the forms a few days before the exam. Quite a few of the comments were almost savage. One wrote that ‘ I am very glad that his teaching is over, which I was looking forward to ’.

 

The forms were distributed to me only after I had marked the assignments and exam papers. I mentioned a few of those negative comments to a senior colleague at WVU College of Law, Professor Pat McGinley. Pat told me that he had also received negative comments in his evaluations from students. Pat mentioned that one of his evaluators (anonymously) wrote that ‘a child of eight can teach better than him’.

 

Now, most Universities in Malaysia, Australia, the South Pacific and the United States would have student evaluations on a sort of compulsory basis. As far as Myanmar is concerned, I am not aware whether or not there is an anonymous, online, compulsory (i.e., all the subjects have to be evaluated by students, albeit not actually forcing the students to do the evaluations).

 

The Non-anonymous nature of student evaluations

I was told by a student that in one particular Law Department in Myanmar, in a class of 30 or 40 select few, say about ten or twenty, have to fill in evaluation forms. I do not know whether the evaluating students had to write their names. Perhaps not. I hope not. A monitor, a student or another teacher who does not teach the course collects the evaluation forms. I also do not know whether or not the evaluation forms were used in assessing the ‘evaluated’ law teachers’ say for their tenure or promotions.

 

I think some form of evaluation of teaching is perhaps advisable. And student evaluations may be necessary, but not sufficient. A three-or four-prong evaluation of teaching ability and competence may be necessary. First, evaluations could be done by the Dean or Head of the Department, secondly by senior and even junior colleagues and then by students. Indeed when I started teaching at the Faculty of Law at the University of Malaya in 1990 in a random check (so to speak) then Dean of the Law Faculty Associate Professor Wan Arfah Hamza checked in my International Law tutorial (she Lectured in international law) for about 30 minutes Decades later in 2008 the then Head of the Department of Law at Multimedia University Ms Flora Teichner also sat in my Contract Law Lecture class and my Lecture was videotaped for about 20 minutes, Later, I was requested to sit in another junior colleagues’ Lecture. I do not recall whether or not I was asked to fill in evaluation forms or at least write my comments.

 

‘Students as customers’ and ‘Teachers can do no wrong and all are worthy of obeisance’?

Still, going back to about 1998 when I was teaching at Deakin Law School in Victoria, Australia, then Head of the Department of Law Professor Philip Clarke said that the main pivot, so to speak, is student evaluations, not the evaluations by senior or junior colleagues. He said to the effect that if ‘two or three Contract Law Professors think that my teaching is fine, but if a majority of students think my teaching is poor, then I am not a good teacher’. This comment, I assert, is treating ‘students as customers’ and the almost corollary that ‘the customer is always right’. On the other hand, in Myanmar, largely due to cultural traditions, the teacher is always right’. Let’s not beat about the bush: some students are mean in person, mean in their evaluations. And some teachers are poor in teaching, mean in their attitudes towards students. In my fairly long experience as both a primary, middle, high school and a University student, I have seen some ineffective and mean teachers. As indeed I have seen generous, brilliant, hard-working, kind and devoted students as well as teachers.

 

In this age of privatization and commercialization ‘students as customers’ seems to be almost the order of the day. In Myanmar -dare I say it- the postulate or perhaps even dogma is that all the teachers deserve unquestioning deference, respect, genuflection, homage so ‘the teacher is not only always right but indeed worthy of reverence, veneration, homage’. Indeed, from what I had observed in teacher homage ceremonies here, students have to prostrate themselves on the ground and, among others, ‘beg for forgiveness if they have any transgressions against them in thought, word and deed’! At times, from my experience, the ‘transgressions’ can also occasionally come from the other side (that is, from the teachers).

 

In 2017, the University of Mandalay law student team went for the International Criminal Law moot competition in Nuremberg, Germany. Absolutely free of charge, I trained them for about ten to fifteen hours in mock moot sessions. The team had to submit me­morials written in English by about 3 am Myanmar standard time on a particular June day in 2017. Till about 2 am, I helped edit the memorials through emails and made phone calls between Mandalay and Yangon to help the students edit and improve the contents and style of the memorials.