District Institutes of Education and Training - Teacher Education

District Institutes of Education and Training: A Comparative Study in Three Indian States
to develop and refine their skills once the initial input has been provided. In both
cases, however overall responsibility for capacity development of CRCs was not
seen to be the DIET’s. The opposite was the case in Surat and Indore DIETs
where, without the DPEP, both DIETs understood the need to invest in
development of the Cluster resource.
Box 6.1: Capacity development of BRC and CRCs, Santramapur 1998
• Competition among BRC/CRC co-ordinators, (PM 25.3.98; BK 27.3.98;
Dang 30.3.98]: preparing TLM, self-composition of songs, stories, activity
bank; debate on differents aspects of DPEP thrust areas; contents of Stds 1-
5. outcomes: developed understandings about activities to be performed
under DPEP for quality improvement and focus groups; developed self
composition skills; developed understanding about roles they have to play
for academic support to teachers; create enthusiasm for better performance
of DPEP; motivate others to participate in educational activities at district /
CRC level.
• Textbook training for RPs for pilot phase– 8-13 Aug 98
• Gender sensitisation – guidance on specific role on gender and specified
activities to be followed under it, also what to be done when they find
gender disparities on visits to schools and classrooms 13-14 April 98
• Pre-elementary linkages with ICDS officers 8.9.98
• Role in AS, satellite schools concept, and materials preparation
• Planning and management Dec 98 – CRCs and BRCs as a leader and
motivater at the school level
• Orientation on GER and NER – interpretations and strategy to be adopted
In the two DPEP Districts, the team found that while DIET claimed a role in
providing academic support to Resource Centres, Centre staff did not reflect this
perception. Rather, the absence of DIET staff was noted, and therefore there was
little to comment on in relation to their making inputs to meetings. This was
comprehensively brought out by teachers in a piece of action research by Dhar
DIET (see chapter 7).
Discussions with teachers indicated that teachers felt most of their academic
problems can be solved at the Cluster or Block Resource Centres. No instances of
DIET expertise having been helpful were cited in either interview or during school
observations. There was a strong call for DIET staff to visit schools to evaluate
progress in scheme implementation from teachers in Dhar District, linked to a
view that if DIET staff visited schools they would be able to improve the relevance
of training programmes. There were other instances where DIETs were seen to
have a quasi-inspectoral role to play - as persons who may be able to convince
recalcitrant teachers to adopt a child-centred pedagogy because they are perceived
as being more senior, and therefore more able to exert pressure than the peer
group.
DFID 127