In its bid to nurture the "next generation of teachers", the Delhi government has proposed to establish Delhi Teachers' University to offer four-year integrated teachers' education programmes like BA-BEd, BSc-BEd.
Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal-led Delhi cabinet approved a proposal on Monday to establish this specialised university to further revolutionise the education sector in Delhi. "The university will prepare highly qualified and well-trained teachers in Delhi itself.... Delhi Teachers' University will be a public university dedicated to preparing excellent quality teachers for the city across different school stages," said Kejriwal in his statement.
"The students of this university will be attached with Delhi government schools for the entire duration of their course to get hands-on experience with strong emphasis on action-research," he said.
Delhi Teachers' University Bill 2021 will be placed before the Delhi Vidhan Sabha in the upcoming assembly session. Admissions are set to start in the academic session of 2022-23. The campus will be set up in Bakkarwala village in west Delhi.
"The university will be a centre of excellence in teacher preparation at both pre-service and in-service in the areas of education studies, leadership and policy. It will engage in world-class teaching and research in emerging areas of teacher education to achieve excellence in school education through national and international collaborations," said Kejriwal. Vice-chancellor and professors will be of "global repute", he said.
The university is envisaged to align with the reforms that have been initiated in the public school education system in the capital where government schools have become part of the national conversation. For more than five years now, the pass percentage in government schools are better than the private ones in the city.
Currently, teachers are trained through a system of mentors and teacher development coordinators in government schools. Girijesh Kumar Yadav teaches classes 6 to 10 at the Government Boys Senior Secondary School, Nithari. In September 2019, he was taken to Singapore for five days to study the island-city's progressive education system as part of his in-service training. "With a proper university for teachers, the benefits of having trained teachers specific to the requirements of Delhi schools will start to be felt from the beginning itself, instead of relying on intermittent in-service training," says Yadav. "A lot has changed since I started teaching 13 years ago, especially with a pandemic. A university for teachers to address these changes is much needed."
