MAJOR INITIATIVES TO DEAL WITH SHORTAGE
OF TEACHERS
The National Council
for Teacher Education (NCTE) has, in line with the government’s
commitment to the Universalisation of Elementary Education, taken
a number of initiatives to bridge the huge gap between teacher
availability and teacher requirement in the country. The NCTE
has decided to:
- allow State Governments to increase
the intake of their District Institutes of Educational Training
(DIET’s) from 50 to 200 seats per year; to meet the huge shortfall
in teacher availability, the NCTE proposes to accord recognition
for new Basic Teacher Certificate (BTC) courses for elementary
school teachers in B.Ed institutions after obtaining an NOC
from the State Government and upto the level of intake allowed
for B.Ed. courses; and to facilitate State-specific requests
for bridge courses for qualified B.Ed candidates, so as to
give them an orientation for teaching primary and elementary
classes, the NCTE proposes to allow special courses to State
Governments as an interim measure.
- The NCTE also assessed the availability
of teacher training institutions in various States and found
that in some States such as Bihar, Jharkhand, Orissa and West
Bengal, there is a major mismatch between large teacher requirement
and a shortage of institutional seats. To cater to such States,
the NCTE proposes to encourage organizations and institutions
in the voluntary sector, with credible experience of in-service
elementary teacher training, to start basic teacher certificate
training programme as well.
All BTC courses conducted
by Government or private institutions will be within the purview
of the State Council of Educational Research and Training for
the purposes of curriculum and conduct of examinations, etc. The
NCTE also examined the problem of large number of untrained teachers
existing in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Assam, several
other North Eastern States, Orissa and Jharkhand. The NCTE would
encourage these State Governments to come up with State specific
in-service training programmes to clear the backlog of untrained
teachers, with the proviso that these teachers have taught for
two academic years and have also acquired the minimum academic
qualifications for primary school teachers, laid down by NCTE.
The NCTE also considered
re-organization of the BTC curriculum so as to equip elementary
school teachers with skills and abilities to interact with local
communities, especially the Panchayati Raj system, which is playing
an increasing role in school management. It has also been recommended
that, State Governments should specify a sustained period for
on-the-job training so that elementary level teacher trainees
begin to understand the socio-cultural context in which they will
be required to perform.
The NCTE has also
decided to continuously monitor on a half yearly basis the progress
in implementation of these decisions so as to ensure that State
Governments are able to provide adequate number of trained elementary
teachers in order to meet the goal of quality education under
SSA. The NCTE is consciously facilitating the State Governments
to build a responsive and quality based institutional structure
to promote good quality elementary school teachers who can in
turn ensure enhanced student learning.
Under the Sarva Shiksha
Abhiyan launched by the Government of India, the country is committed
to attain universal primary education by 2007 and universal elementary
education by 2010. The NCTE examined the availability of trained
elementary school teachers in the country, as well looked at the
State-wise capacity for training of elementary school teachers,
in view of the massive challenges for quality education under
SSA. To attain the objective of Universalisation of Elementary
Education, the Planning Commission had estimated a requirement
of around additional 11.5 lakhs trained teachers, in the country.
It is expected that
the new initiatives taken by the Council would make a large number
of trained teachers available in the elementary education sector.
