IIT Bombay starts training 10,000 teachers

The training programme for 10,000 teachers was inaugurated Monday by Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal at the Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay.

Under the 'Talk to a Teacher' project of the National Mission on Education through Information and Communication Technology (NME-ICT) of his ministry, training for 10,000 engineering college teachers from across the country is conducted by leveraging broadband network and ICT tools.

The programme is being conducted through 168 remote centres across India. The lectures are delivered from IIT Bombay by professors of the institute and IIT Madras.

Through the software A-VIEW, audio-video connectivity is provided between all the centres and IIT Bombay. The course consists of lectures, live interactions and lab sessions.

"This method of synchronous education has been developed at IIT Bombay, under the leadership of D.B. Phatak. This method of education allows participation of a large number of women teachers, who normally are unable to join contact programmes at distant locations, owing to family commitments," an IIT official said.

Sibal interacted with the remote centres from Kanyakumari, Rajkot, Srinagar and Nagpur.
A representative of IIT Bombay presented an Aakash Tablet to the minister.

Unlike other tablet devices, Aakash could also be used to create computer programmes in Python, C, C++ and Scilab, he said.