Close teacher education colleges with poor enrolment: NCTE chief

In an effort to garner opinions for drafting of the New Education Policy, the National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE) held a regional-level consultation meet (Southern Region) here on Saturday.

The meet was held to discuss various aspects related to teacher education that needed to be revamped.

Speaking on the occasion, NCTE chairperson Santosh Panda opined that there was a need to shut down teacher education institutions with poor enrolment.

These institutions had mushroomed, but were unable to secure adequate number of students, he observed. Further, he felt there was a need for indigenisation of teacher education system. While emulating Western models, there was a need to combine these with indigenous methods, he felt.

That apart, participants in the meet emphasised that the new policy should be pragmatic and grounded in reality. Transparency in regulation and accreditation process for improving the quality of teacher education, drafting of a teacher education curriculum, focus on yoga education, use of information and communication technology were among the other issues raised. The participants also proposed a national teacher education qualification framework.

Call for revised policy
The NCTE meeting comes in the wake of the initiative of the Ministry of Human Resources Development to come up with a revised national education policy.

 The first National Policy on Education was framed in 1968 based on the recommendations of the Kothari Commission (1964-68). The second one was drafted in 1986 and revised in 1992.

Prof D P Singh, director, NAAC, Prof Panda, chairperson, NCTE, Dr Renu Batra, joint secretary, UGC, Prof Saroj Yadav, dean (academic), NCERT, Prof Ahrar Hasan, dean, Jamia Milia University, Prof S K Yadav, academic consultant, NCTE, were among those present.