The World Bank and European Commission help Bihar in imparting training and Education

                                                           

PATNA: The World Bank  and European Commission are likely to help Bihar in imparting training and education to a large army of untrained school teachers. In this regard, a three-day international conference on use of Information Communication Technology (ICT) and Open & Distance Learning (ODL) in teacher education began here on Wednesday. Jointly organized by the Centre and the state government in partnership with the WB and EC, it is being attended by representatives of eight states and educationists from different countries.
 CM Nitish Kumar, in his inaugural address, favoured innovations in teacher education, saying they will help in improving the quality of education. Stressing on the need for training teachers, he said it has to be improved qualitatively as there could not be any compromise on quality education. "We need a large number of teachers for 1:30 ratio of teacher and students in primary schools," he said.
He said for training 40,000 teachers through distance mode, as per the provision of the Right to Education (RTE) Act, the state government had entered into an agreement with the IGNOU, but it was not found to be satisfactory. And, the state has no proper institutions to take up this job.
"We are looking at the WB for help and expect to reach an agreement under which the WB will provide 70% loan while the state government will provide a share of 30% of the project cost," said Nitish. He said local contents should be included in the training programme and teachers should also get regular guidance to deliver quality education.
The CM was quite concerned over the poor attendance of children in schools across the state and said that during his Seva Yatra he reviewed performance of schools in the districts and found that the attendance was not more than 50-60% of the enrolment.
"The poor attendance is a major challenge. We are providing scholarships to a majority of students, uniform, midday meal and bicycle from Class IX, still there is a wide gap between enrolment and attendance. I have asked all the DMs to visit villages and talk to guardians why the children are not going to school," Nitish said.
WB's operation adviser Michael Haney spoke about the innovative approaches for teachers' education and the WB engagement in Bihar. He said with the improvement in basic education, the core problems of poverty and basic amenities can be solved.
Haney said Bihar has requested the WB to provide support in development of distance education curriculum, related syllabi, content, effective delivery mechanism, appropriate student support system and assessment strategies for addressing the needs of the large group of untrained teachers. He hoped the Bihar experience will form a template for developing an ICT based teacher education system that could be used as a useful reference point by other states facing similar problems.
Hans van Vliet, first counsellor, development cooperation, Delegation of the European Union to India, spoke about the teacher education and said it was an emerging area of engagement for development partners. He also threw light on the EC's programme of skill upgradation for quality education and modernization of education through latest techniques.
Education minister P K Shahi said a lot more needs to be done in education sector in the state. He said at least one lakh trained teachers are needed. Shahi said Bihar has earmarked about 14% of its total budgetary allocation for education.