growing trees vs. educating people ? - 十年樹木, 百年樹人

an old Chinese proverb,  meaning, 

“It takes ten years to grow a tree.  It takes a hundred years to educate a person.”

implying,

“it takes much more time and effort  to educate a person  than to grow a tree”

A previous teacher of mine heard this in a conference :  teachers usually have to say things more than 10 times before those things would get into the mind of a student. 

That explains how hard it is to educate a person !!      

 

十年 =  10 years,      樹 =  grow,          木 = wood = tree (in this context),
百年 =  100 years,    人 = person,     樹人 = educate a person