Zero To Hero – Navin (professor X)

Do you know, that Cerebral palsy (CP) is the most common motor disability in childhood? According to the population-based studies from around the world report prevalence estimates of CP ranging from 1.5 to more than 4 per 1,000 live births or children of a defined age range. And about 1 in 323 children has been identified with CP according to estimates from Centres for disease control and prevention’s (CDC) Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring (ADDM) Network.

As we see, there are many people around us who when through cerebral palsy too. One of them is Navin Nair. Despite his physically limiting challenge he fought through his obstacles and use it as a stair to climb up to his success.

The Beginning

Naveen was a premature baby who was given birth at just 6.5 months which led to damage to his cerebellum, the part of his brain which controls movement, coordination and fine motor skills.

This condition limited his movements especially to his muscles in the limbs. These caused him to face a lot of challenges and limitations in life. It’s like the feeling of your limbs being tied tightly with a rubber band and trying to move.

Navin started to realize this when he was young, when he saw he was different from his family, neighbor and even strangers. Realizing he was different and being confused on why is this happening to him, was his first challenge.

But despite those challenges after being certified as mentally fit to study, Navin placed his focus and importance on education. Let’s explore his journey from the past.

Primary school
Navin first started primary school in 1994.  It was the first few phase of his life where Navin experienced social stigma. People in school and his classmates started looking at him with a different perspective from other able-bodied people.

Hence they feared to interact with him and wondered if he will be able to cope in the education system or “pull the others down”. Due to this forthcoming issue, Navin planned how he is going to relate his physical challenge and communicate with his peers. That helped him to gain friends. But not all of them, some were still sceptical including his teachers.

Some teachers were not appreciative of his presence. They were demotivating and discouraging him on the way he studied. By saying, “If you go on doing things this way, you will never be able to go through this level successfully or you are writing too slow I have a timeline to follow”. That was very saddening and worrying for Navin given at that young age.

He referred this issue to his doctor at National University of Hospital(NUH) where his doctor did an assessment in his writing skill and speed. This result was given to the Ministry of Education(MOE) which extended his time for exams. This helped Naveen to complete his primary school and progressed on to his secondary school life successfully.

Secondary school
As time passed, secondary 1 and secondary 2 seemed normal for Navin. But he had to be exempted from subjects like Home economics, Design & Technology and Arts, because of his slow reflexes and coordination due to his condition. The reasons are, he can’t even draw a straight line with a ruler, or do things like cutting, which seems dangerous for him.

He was also excused during his physical education class, given his condition. For these periods, Navin will sit in the classroom alone, and switch his focus on other subjects like Math, English, Science by doing self-assessment.

But when Navin went Sec 3 he started to face more problems. One of it is, due to needing help in moving from one class to another and help for washroom needs, his aunty and the helper will take turns to assist him on that in school.

Aunty and helper

But other secondary school boys started to feel uncomfortable, especially when the females (Navin’s aunty and helper) enter the male’s toilet. Hence, one or few of the boys, anonymously gave complain to the principle regarding this matter.

After deciding, the principle called upon Navin to her office and discussed about the issues with him. After a long discussion, Navin suggested to speak to his therapist regarding this issue to find a suitable solution for him.

Immediately, his therapist came down to the school and trained few boys who are interested in moving Navin around and for his toilet use. Another challenge Navin faced was moving to classes which require him to go to higher levels of the building.

As students improve to the next level within their primary or secondary school, they will have to climb up the building for their classes which was difficult for Navin given his condition. And there were no lift build then.

Most of the time, people of his family carried him up and down which got them very tired. Thus, they decided to give feedback to MOE regarding this issue. Next that particular class moved to the ground floor which became convenient for Naveen and his other classmates. ‘THAT IS AWESOME!’

But now lifts are built in most schools. “Thank you Navin!”. After that Navin wanted to progress further towards success, hence, he did his Higher nitec in a Institute of Technical Education.

Tertiary levels
Naveen studied at Institute of technical education (ITE), Bishan, for the course of Higher Nitec in Accounting. As travelling is sometimes a hassle for most of us. Navin received a taxi subsidy scheme from a voluntary welfare organisation (VWO), where he will be able to travel to important places in a taxi with subsidies rate.

Which is only limited to the places the person with disability(PWD) work or study at. Hence it was helpful for Navin to use it and graduate in his education in ITE. After which Navin wanted to further his education in Diploma.

Navin with lecturer

Thus, he went to do a diploma in international business at MDIS which is situated at Queenstown. But at that point of time the VWO faced some issues on validating his taxi subsidy scheme again from ITE. Therefore, Naveen decided spontaneously to travel in a public transport.

But that seemed scary for him, as he used less of the public transport previously which caused him to develop a negative limiting fear of the peak hour crowd, especially on the bus waiting time for boarding and exiting and etc.

But despite all those challenges he tried. He will take a bus from his place and then a train. Due to his great blessings, train staffs will assist him in the train to board and alight and to also keep the train doors opened for a longer period of time for his entry and exit. That smooth journey allowed Naveen to graduate from the ITE.

Phase of “Unstoppable”
After that he went higher on the path of education, like Bachelor’s of business adminsteration in international business at SCU Austrailia 2010, Masters in business administration majoring human resource Nothingmanagement from wales bridge university through distance learning in 2014 and Doctorate of business administration majoring in managerial science at 2017.

He also studied extra courses in learning difficulties, special education, inclusion education,  disability management and assistive technology. He is also an external consultant for the physically challenged at Land transport Authority (LTA), freelance facilitator for bachelors and diploma level in disability studies, special education and inclusion ambassador at Disability People’s Association.

Wow! So much of credentials and achievements towards a greater

successes! Awesome job Navin😉

*I will like to thank Mediacorp’s Vasantham channel for this video which they recorded about Navin. Which means this material was not created and owned by Believe to Success*

When asked why are you putting in so much of importance in studies? “He replied that is my only best vehicle in life to achieve success given my physical challenge, hence, I want to do good in it”.

Naveen believes that God has his own set of calculations for sending him to this earth with this kind of physical challenge. He also believes that the answer to the theory above was because God thinks he has the capacity and capability to overcome all these obstacles and achieve success in life despite these challenges. “Yea, he truly do and inspiring many who thinks they can’t”.

Despite learning his primary language like English and Tamil, Naveen also picked up languages in Malayalam, Hindi,  and Malay. He also has been trying to and is independent in various tasks, but until now he has to have his helper(maid) to travel with him to places like the school.

Naveen is grateful to the Voluntary Welfare Organisations(VWO) in Singapore like Asian’s Women Welfare Association and Serving People with Disability for aiding in ways to be inclusive in the society. They understood his needs and catered for that.

Example, the VWO’s came down to visit the teachers of his schools, explained and guide them the proper method to assist Naveen and also the school to extend his timing for his exams.

According to Navin, “Life is challenging whether you are able or not. A disability should not stop you from living your life.”

When ask what made him come this far, he says: “I never did see disability as a problem!”

          So what is stopping all you people out there? No matter a able-bodied person or a disabled person, there are no limits except for the ones you set for yourself. If Navin did it, you can do it too!!

–> Click here to watch Navin’s interview with me about his challenges and changes which can be made for a more inclusive society in YouTube <–

Do share with us your stories of challenges to success in any situation  in livetobelieve4success@gmail.com, I will do a blog about it. Your story will encourage and motivate others to achieve success too!

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