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Education
Meaningful researches & value added services
IN A recent National level Test, I was amazed to find a peculiar unanimity on one point among the examinees. They all stated unequivocally that the NCTE (National Council for Teacher Education) — the apex controller and guide of teachers' destiny, has failed to deliver. The examinees went on to add that they would have been much happier had this branch of professional training continued to remain with the University Grants Commission (UGC) or, if the creation of a separate body had become so essential, then it should have been mandated not to act in a hurry to implement half-baked, uninformed policies in such a slip-shod manner, as has actually happened. Instead, the newly created body should have been asked to study the world trends in detail and offered couple of models to the Indian States and universities to choose from. In a huge country like ours, with all kinds of disparities, no single model could ever hope to succeed and hence all the trouble. The change of guard in the apex system has also not contributed much.
On the contrary, what should have remained merely rumours, are being considered ground-realities. If the registrar of a university issued two contradictory orders within a week on the question of affiliation just because the apex body itself is unsure of its intentions, one needs no further proof that things are not right after all. There is no other statutory Government of India body like the NCTE that has sunk so low in public esteem. I think the time is almost ripe that someone took note of the reasons why this should have happened, if it is really the case. It would be inappropriate for anyone even to suggest that the stories making rounds in the relevant quarters have even an iota of truth in them. It is possible that these stories have gained momentum only because the concerned organisation itself has cottoned ears and has earned the sobriquet of being the most arrogant and rigid system that any Government ever devised.
It is quite legitimate to inquire into the reasons why must the UGC prepare syllabi for the B.Ed. programme when the NCTE claims it had done that exercise already? The details that have come to dominate private discussions are not covering anyone with glory. Why not make the details public. In fact, it is imperative to find out that why is the NCTE continuing to accord legal status to private centres for starting B.Ed. when enough number of proper colleges already exist? The interesting point that has not escaped anyone's notice is that academically advanced States have not been too keen to take benefit of this largesse. Someone therefore must answer the query; "Has the Government of India mandated the NCTE to offer employment opportunities to those in the economically starved States? And, why have these benefits been limited to those university departments of education that have only academic mediocrity as their sole criterion for existence?" In the past couple of years the number of poor quality doctoral theses that has come out of the university departments of education made one to sit up and ask, "If the UGC has not been too keen to improve the quality of its Ph.Ds, does it imply that the NCTE too should ignore its domain of quality assurance?"
Every time someone raises an issue that the Government should take note of this situation, the NCTE feels as though its authority has been challenged and, by listening to dissent is either sidelined or the dissenter is coerced into inaction. But thus far so much has already come out into the open and is being discussed across the nation that any effort to ignore the seriousness of the allegations would additionally jeopardise the legitimacy of the apex system. In no case, the past or future of the NCTE can be allowed to remain part of examination papers alone where the following type of questions are repeatedly asked; such as, 'Give reasons for the decline and fall of the Moghul Empire'. It is in the interest of all if someone is asked to examine the whole matter in detail and the report is made public.
We must also go into all the researches that the Government of India has funded thus far on these issues and match the actions taken with the problems originally raised. The track record of the Government in this regard has been abysmally poor. For example, we know that all efforts to universalise education have thus far remained only pious wishes. We have not been told exactly the role teacher training has played in this failure. Has anyone ever asked why trained teachers do not take classes?
Do we have a teacher-training programme for teaching in unconventional manner and in places not exactly designated as classrooms? If we are so concerned about making teacher training courses available to all and sundry whose sole qualification is that they can afford high fees, and in providing employment to those who never deserved to be teachers anywhere in the world in the first place, we must answer the question, "Is NCTE meant to legitimise irregularities?"
Recently, the Prime Minister said the name of UGC should be changed to accommodate the emerging concerns of higher education and shifting the focus from the present to the future, I suspect there are enough grounds to suggest that the NCTE could also attempt to improve its image to earn some degree of respectability. It is not enough that it has certain statutory powers. It should also appear to others that the same are being exercised to benefit all and in national interest.
One should remember that the need for the NCTE arose because a few universities had started funding their new schemes by mass-producing education degrees. The teacher training programmes allegedly got diluted and the standards lowered to suit the average candidate's talent. Also, the distinction between the correspondence and regular courses got so blurred that it became meaningless to distinguish between the two. Neither then nor now does anyone know whether teacher training is a skill area or is information-based. A definitive answer to this question will decide once and for all whether or not this programme can be offered through distance mode. One must also promote researches and disseminate findings when they seek to improve any existing practice or thought process. The challenges to all kinds of training are coming from the latest technology. Countries like India lack support to innovations and have failed miserably in evolving methods for teaching creativity. Why does teacher training not address this problem? As a policy, the Governments should regularly review the working of their statutory bodies.
China is a literate nation. Have we ever bothered to find out how and why China has succeeded?. Has any department of education ever conducted a research in this area and suggested to our people ways to emulate China? We must examine why Japanese teachers are so committed and Indians are not. What we need is meaningful researches and value added services and not merely talks on value education.
R. P. Singh
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