Recent NCTE Initiatives: A Brief Glimpse

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Sheila Rosemary Paul
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1 Recent NCTE Initiatives: A Brief Glimpse Prof. Mohd. Akhtar Siddiqui Chairperson, NCTE Prof. Anandakrishnan, Chair of the function, Hon ble Union Minister for HRD, Shri Kapil Sibal ji, Hon ble Minister of State for HRD, Smt. Purandeswari ji, Madam Anshu Vaish, Secretary, School Education & Literacy, MHRD, distinguished guests, Vice Chancellors, media, officials of the NCTE, ladies and gentlemen, today we are here to celebrate the 15 th Foundation Day of NCTE. The NCTE has been in existence for over 35 years now but it got the statutory status in the year Fifteen years is not a long period in the life of an institution but is sufficient to take stock of, what it has been able to accomplish, what it ought to have achieved, but could not due to various constraints. The NCTE Act enjoins upon the Council to strive for improving the quality of teacher preparation in the country and also to ensure planned and coordinated development of teacher education. The quality of teacher education not only depends on professionally sound and relevant curriculum, but also on the way curriculum is implemented in Teacher Education Institutions. This, in turn, depends on the expertise of the faculty and its quality and the infrastructural and instructional facilities provided in the Institutions. It is on this premise that the NCTE has adopted a two pronged strategy to ensure quality in teacher education. The first strategy involves development of Curriculum Guidelines through nation wide consultations and consensus and then persuading and supporting the State governments and universities to undertake renewal of their teacher education curricula. The second strategy involves development of Norms and Standards in respect of various teacher education programmes, assessment of capabilities of new institutions for offering TE programmes and continuous monitoring and supervision of recognized institutions and, if necessary, taking action against the institutions found violating the prescribed Norms and Standards. As a part of its endeavours to modernize the content of teacher education programmes, the non-statutory NCTE brought out its first Curriculum Framework in the year 1978, which provided a basis to the universities and SCERTS to undertake renewal of secondary and elementary teacher education programmes, respectively. After acquiring statutory status, the NCTE brought out another curriculum framework in the year 1998, which also resulted in curriculum renewal in many States. In order to concretize the imperatives of NCF 2005 and also to address the concerns of RTE Act 2009, the NCTE brought out the latest National Curriculum Framework for Teacher Education (NCFTE) in early While suggesting a number of alternative structures of Teacher Education, the Framework emphasizes the need for the reorganization of curriculum so as to make teacher education a vehicle for professionalisation of teaching. It aims at preparing teachers as a reflective practitioner capable of facilitating students to construct their own knowledge. We are 1

2 now in the process of initiating dialogue with the universities and SCERTs to urge them to undertake revision of their syllabi in the light of the guidelines provided in the NCFTE. Already a set of suggestive syllabi for different levels of teacher education based on the vision contained in the Curriculum Framework have been developed by teams of experts for the guidance and help of implementing institutions and placed in public domain more than a month ago. The NCTE also provides professional support to TE institutions and Teacher Educators in several other ways. For instance, NCTE has brought out reference reading material on the educational thoughts and contributions of Mahatma Gandhi, Sri Aurobindo, Dr. Zakir Hussain, Gijju Bhai Badheka, etc. Recently, NCTE published a Manual for TEIs which provides detailed guidelines for the organization of their Teaching Learning Resources in the areas of Science and Mathematics, Arts and Crafts, Educational Psychology, ICT, Library and Health and Physical Education. During the preceding academic year, NCTE published a source book on Teacher Education, which includes scholarly papers on different aspects of teacher education written by well known educationists in the country. The NCTE also publishes two biannual professional journals titled Indian Journal of Teacher Education, and Teacher Support. In order to empower teacher educators with technology and the associated pedagogic skills, NCTE has renewed its MoU with Intel Teach for undertaking the joint project XPDITTE (X-elerated Professional Development in the Integration of Technology in Teacher Education) for integrating technology in education. The Council is also assisting MHRD in the implementation of RTE Act 2009 in several ways. As the designated Academic Authority for prescribing qualifications for elementary teachers, the Council has approved these qualifications and the same have been submitted to the MHRD for vetting. Two expert groups have also been formed to develop guidelines for State Teacher Eligibility Test and Code of Professional Ethics for Teachers. Another expert Committee is busy in developing norms and syllabus for the special certificate course of six months duration in elementary education, included in the proposed qualification for teachers, for those with a D.Ed. (Special Education) or B.Ed. (Special Education) with a view to bring them in the mainstream of Elementary Education. Work of all these Committees is in advanced stage of completion. During the past fifteen years, the system of Teacher Education has witnessed unprecedented expansion. The expansion per se cannot be faulted if it meets the increasing requirement of professionally trained teachers but it becomes a matter of great concern if it leads to over supply of teachers and the matter assumes serious proportions, if it leads to deterioration in the quality of teacher preparation. We have taken steps to strengthen our monitoring and supervision system. The NCTE Act empowers the NCTE to revisit TEIs, provide them feedback for improvement and if they fail to do so and contravene the regulations, their recognition can be withdrawn 2

3 by the Council. During the year , around 600 institutions faced derecognition and notices have been served on many others. Regional imbalance in the teacher training capacity development has also been a matter of serious concern. While Northern, Southern and Western Regions of the country have almost reached the saturation point, there is still need for creating more teacher training capacity in the Eastern and North Eastern Regions. We are looking at this issue with all seriousness. In this regard, State Governments, philanthropists and private institutions also need to partner in and play a pro-active role in these regions. The responsibility for ensuring quality in teacher education on continuing basis has to be shared by all the stakeholders including NCTE, Universities, State Education Departments, SCERTs, etc. We expect the State Governments and Universities who organize admissions and examinations of students in these institutions under a prescribed curriculum to continuously monitor the day to day functioning of these institutions and implementation of the processes by them as contained in the curriculum and share with us their findings to enable us to initiate appropriate action in the matter. If all the stakeholders join together and pool their resources, we shall certainly succeed in improving the quality of teacher preparation in our country and in creating an impact on the school education system in the right direction. I will also take this opportunity to express my satisfaction that the tasks, which were in hand at the time of last Annual Day have been successfully accomplished. To name a few, revision of NCTE Regulations, 2007 and notification of New Regulations, 2009 with Norms and Standards of 13 courses; conclusion of the study on Demand and Supply Estimates of School Teachers and Teacher Educators and printing and dissemination of the state reports, renewal of MoU for training of educators in integration of ICT in Teacher Education; review of the DPE programme for training of untrained teachers in the State of Bihar in collaboration with IGNOU, development of suggestive syllabi for different teacher education programmes in the light of new curriculum framework, etc. The arrangement made by the Council in collaboration with C-DAC for having a comprehensive MIS and associated system for online submission and processing of applications has been in operation for the last one year. This has been further extended and NCTE now proposes to put the process of appeal also online. The Council, subsequently also felt that all recognized teacher training institutions in the country need to place the details of infrastructural and instructional facilities available with them in a public gaze. As such, a computerized online Self Disclosure Proforma was developed by NCTE in collaboration with C-DAC and all recognized teacher training institutions were requested to fill it up through NCTE website and a special portal was developed for this purpose. Institutions have been asked to upload their data by 31 st August, 2010 on this portal. It has been 3

4 made clear that action will be initiated against those institutions who fail to do so before the stipulated date or who upload wrong information in their proforma. The NCTE proposes to award a unique identity to each of the teacher training institutions after verification of details uploaded on the Portal. An associated and complementary portal with this Self Disclosure Proforma is for the award of a unique identity to each of the teacher educator appointed by different teacher training institutions in the country. The problem of showing fake names and duplicity in appointment of same teachers by different teacher training institutions will be fully curbed through this exercise. The steps of compulsory self disclosure and derecognition of many institutions have already caused some commotion among the teacher education institutions and have made many of them to improve which is precisely the ultimate objective of all such actions. In addition to its academic and Regulatory functions, the Council has been endeavouring to have its own building, for its office in Delhi and in the Regions. In this regard it gives me great pleasure to announce that the building construction of the Southern Regional Committee in Bangalore has been completed and it is in its final phases of fitting fixtures and furnishing and would be occupied soon. The clearances for initiating the construction of the Headquarters building at Dwarka in Delhi is in its final stages and the construction of the building by the CPWD is to start shortly. In keeping with the commitment made in the new Curriculum Framework, NCTE also plans to soon start development of quality resource material for different teacher education programmes so that faculty and students of these programmes can have access to standard reference material. Besides bridging the resource gap, such material is also expected to contribute significantly in improving the quality of teaching learning in teacher education institutions. Soon we will also embark on developing norms and curriculum for some innovative teacher education programmes which should be at a distinct variance from the existing ones. For example, two year B.Ed. and two year M.Ed. programmes are a couple of such alternatives under consideration. We feel that given the mandate contained in the NCTE Act, besides acting as a regulator, the Council has a crucial role to play in terms of providing academic and professional support to teacher education institutions and their faculty. Some of the activities mentioned earlier precisely highlight this particular role of the Council. In this regard the Council often feels handicapped owing to non availability of academic positions in its organizational structure which has also been highlighted by the Kaul Committee a few years ago. Recently, the Council has resolved to request the Govt. of India to sanction some such academic positions to enable it to play its role in a much varied fashion and impact the teacher education system in a more meaningful manner than what it is doing at present. I am sure that the Hon ble HRM will kindly consider this recommendation of the Council sympathetically. 4

5 I wish to place on record our heartfelt gratitudes to the Hon ble HRM for the personal interest taken by him in the activities of the NCTE and for his continued encouragement of our humble endeavours. The series of reforms envisioned and initiated by him in terms of setting up of a national accreditation authority and educational tribunals and evolving a strong mechanism to curb malpractices in educational institutions will surely benefit the teacher education system as well, and will go a long way in strengthening the entire education system. I am equally grateful to the Hon ble Minister of State for HRD as well as Madam Secretary of Education for their guidance and encouragement in our activities. 5

UNIVERSITY OF MYSORE * * *

UNIVERSITY OF MYSORE * * * UNIVERSITY OF MYSORE STATUTES RELATING TO DIRECT RECRUITMENT AND CAREER ADVANCEMENT SCHEME AND MISCELLANEOUS PROVISIONS TO IMPLEMENT THE UGC PAY SCALES TO TEACHERS, PRINCIPALS OF THE CONSTITUENT COLLEGES,