Autobiography and more…..

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My name is Ravneet and I am currently located in Burns Lake, British Columbia. My home town is Chandigarh (India) where I have lived for 27 years of my life. I moved to Canada in 2018 and ever since then BC is my new home. I never planned or dreamt of moving to a new country but then this is life – the journey to unplanned and unexplored paths!!!

In my student life, I used to help my younger brother and my friends in their studies. Growing up, I realized I had interest in teaching or I should say tutoring – that what’s we say it in India (when you teach/help students outside of class). Long story short, I used to spend my evenings/weekends tutoring high school and undergraduate students.

My professional Identity

I am currently working as an Academic Advisor with College of New Caledonia since June 2019. My past work experience includes working as an Academic Upgrading Instructor as well as Program Coordinator for post-secondary institutions of BC. It’s been more than 6 years now working in student services and I feel fortunate that I am able to help students with their education/career goals.

Personal and Professional Value that guide me as an Instructor

I would like to say here that our personal values are pretty much integrated into our values in professional life. One of my guiding values is self-improvement – we all are work in progress in our personal and professional life. My aim is to strive for continuously improving and building upon my skills and expertise and keep on exploring and learning new skills.

One more value that I would like to talk here about is Honesty. When I say honest – it means being honest with your own self and to others. It’s easier when you can acknowledge and be truthful about your strengths and weaknesses.

I am not currently teaching at the moment but one of the value that is a guiding principle for me is to be unbiased. When you are dealing with students, you can form bias quite easily. I ensure that I listen to my students/clients with a mind free of judgement and bias.

Being rational and flexible is another key value that takes you a long way. In our professional life, we all come across new and unique situations and every time following the rule book might not be the best solution.

In an era of diverse people working together, being inclusive and respectful towards others is another value that I pursue and abide by.

My truths of teaching

Some of my truths of teaching are:

• Building relationship with each student is important.
• You cannot expect a 100% success from your students.
• Don’t hand hold students – work with them for their success.
• Every teaching assignment is different. What works in one class might not hold true for another class.

I would like to conclude by referring to a quote by Socrates – “I cannot teach anybody anything; I can only make them think.”

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