Committee to Institutionalise Internship of Govt Teachers 

n a meeting of State Education Minister and officials of State Governments on Teacher Education chaired by Smriti Zubin Irani, Union Human Resource Development Minister, it was decided to constitute a Committee to suggest ways to institutionalise an internship of Teacher Education Programmes in Government Schools.

The Committee includes State Education Secretaries of Rajasthan, Karnataka, Uttarakhand, Tripura and representatives of NCTE and KVS. The internship will be for duration of 20 weeks, at the end of which the school will provide feedback on the teaching aptitude of the trainees.

For the first time, an initiative has been taken by the Government to develop an accreditation/grading framework for Teacher Education Institutions so as to provide an idea of the quality of institutes. A Committee was constituted to develop the framework.

A mobile app, for the first time, is being developed in collaboration with MyGov, by the MHRD to enlist citizens who are willing to volunteer as teachers. Eighteen States expressed their willingness to participate in the first phase.

During April-May, 2016, a 2/3 days Workshop for Educational Administrators in Higher Education will be organised by the UGC in five regions across the country. Modules for these workshops will be developed by IIMs. These modules may be adopted by State Governments which can carry the process forward by organising similar workshops.

It was also decided that NCERT will conduct a review of SCERTs and DIETs and prepare a roadmap for strengthening of these institutes. UGC will similarly undertake training of college principals.

All State Education Ministers were requested to prepare a state specific roadmap to address challenges in teacher education and find out solutions to deal with them.

Source: Digital Learning, 11-02-2016