primary school teachers the twists and turns of ... - ERU Consultants

Version 20 Oct 08, edited finalVTraining! Training!In the heartland of IndiaIt was the summer of 2005 and the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan was in its third year ofimplementation when a senior official of a north Indian state asked one of us toaccompany him/her on a tour of summer training of teachers. We were to drivefrom the state capital and cover four districts over a 5-day period.The SSA directorate had prepared the module, which was available in printed form.It covered a range of subject-specific ‘hard spots’, material on child-centred learning(what the trainers called joyful learning) and tracking out of school children throughhousehold surveys. The District Collectors had been informed about the trainingprogramme and its importance in quality improvement. The SSA directorate hadsent out detailed instructions including the schedule of training sessions, thesequence in which they should be conducted and, most importantly, that thesetraining programmes were to be residential. DIET and BRC were involved in makingarrangements, identifying resource persons and disbursing the funds. SCERT hadperhaps been involved in the preparation of the module, but the decisions wereclearly taken by the SSA directorate. Career civil servants were in charge andprofessional teacher educators were assisting the administrators.What we saw on the tour was an eye opener.The first stop was a high school where 200 teachers were supposed to come together inbatches of 40 each for a 6-day refresher training programme. We walked in to find thatthere were three or maybe four batches of 25 to 30 teachers listening to lectures. Welooked around and found that there were maybe 100 teachers of whom very few werewomen.As my companion got busy with administrative matters, I wandered off to talk to theteachers. All of them had a copy of the module. Apparently lectures were delivered fromaround 11 am to about 2.30 or 3 pm. Asked if there were any arrangements for overnightstay, one male teacher said that there were no facilities. Another teacher said: ‘Womencannot stay overnight with men, even Sita had to go through an agni pariksha (trial byfire) when she stayed in another man’s palace. The government has to be sensitive to theproblems of women teachers.’Modules are prepared at the state level without trying to find out what teachers need. Auniform module was being used across the state—across single-teacher, two-teacher andmulti-teacher schools, for regular schools and for alternative schools. When asked whatthey thought of the training programme, the teachers said, ‘It is a formality that we haveto go through. Its okay, some lectures are interesting but the truth is that we do not gainanything significant.’Our next stop was a district which was reported to have a dynamic woman DistrictCollector. The training was being held in a large school. There were six or seven batchesof 30 to 40 teachers. Lectures were in progress, modules were available, there wereblackboards, lunch and tea was served, and residential facilities were provided to all themale teachers. The women teachers were put up in a dharmshala nearby—the DC said51