Teachers to no longer need releases for university courses under Education and Humanities faculty -as Centre of Excellence in Educator Innovation, Learning and Development launched

Teachers interested in pursuing courses offered by the University of Guyana’s Faculty of Education and Humanities (FEH) can now do so completely online, doing away with a requirement that they get releases to pursue those studies, the Ministry of Education has announced.

The announcement was made on Wednesday with the launch of the International Centre of Excellence in Educator Innovation, Learning and Development (ICEEILD) within the FEH.

According to a press release from the Ministry, the Centre will allow persons interested in pursuing courses offered by the FEH to do so online and will be seen as particularly innovatively transformative for teachers, who would otherwise have been required to secure releases from the classroom to attend the University.

The release said that at the launch on Wednesday Minister of Education Priya Manickchand hailed the launch as “a big moment” for teacher education in Guyana, while President of the Guyana Teachers’ Union (GTU) Mark Lyte registered the Union’s support for the initiative.

According to the release, Manickchand said that the idea behind establishing ICEEILD and providing courses offered by FEH online was birthed after the intake at the Cyril Potter College of Education (CPCE) significantly increased when the College decided to offer teacher training online.

The release said Manickchand noted that before the COVID pandemic, teacher training at CPCE was done face-to-face and due to limited accommodation, the College was only able to admit about 535 students per year.

With the closure of the College because of the pandemic, however, the release said that CPCE was eventually forced to offer its programmes online, which the Minister said led to an increase in admissions to some 2000 students as of 2021, since the number of teachers being trained was no longer limited by physical space.

According to the release, Minister Manickchand said that with the increased number of students, there was also an increase in the number of persons pursuing the Associate Degree in Education (ADE) at CPCE.

The release said she explained that with the advent of ICEEILD, when teachers complete their ADE course at CPCE, they will now be able to move on to the University of Guyana where, after two additional years of studies, they will be awarded a full university degree.

The release said Manickchand had noted that with the College producing more teachers eligible to move on to UG to acquire their degree, a problem was created since the university’s FEH could not accommodate the large number of teachers via face-to-face engagement.

As a result, the release said, that the University was tasked with revisiting how it offered its programmes to teachers, which was what ultimately led to the establishment of ICEEILD. It provides for all of the courses offered by the Faculty through the new online platform and they will be taught within a 5-hour period—from— 17:00 to 22:00 hours.

According the release, Manickchand said that this will allow teachers to pursue studies after school hours, thereby reducing the loss of time with students, while noting importantly that teachers will no longer be required to seek releases to pursue courses offered by the FEH.

“It means we’re going to be able to put more and more trained teachers in the classroom and they’re going to be more effective at delivering education,” the release quoted the Minister of Education as saying.

According to the release, Lyte added that teachers welcomed the move to take the University courses online, while offering an opportunity to those teachers who cannot access the online platform to continue benefitting from face-to-face classes as well.

The release said that Vice-Chancellor of the University of Guyana, Professor Paloma Mohamed-Martin, noted that it was Manickchand’s vision for the University to craft a plan to lessen the learning gap, by ensuring teachers were no longer leaving the classroom to teach but at the same time not depriving them of the opportunity to further their studies.

Meanwhile the press statement said that Dean of the Faculty of Education and Humanities Dr Roslin Khan underscored that the ICEEILD will lay the foundation for ongoing training opportunities in relevant theories and provide learning opportunities for academic and professional training within communities, while adding that targeted participants will include trained or untrained teachers and other interested adult learners both in and out of Guyana.

According to the release, Coordinator of the FEH at the Berbice Campus, Camania Khedaroo, said that the Centre offers educators the learning opportunities and experiences that will allow them to critically engage with current and evolving dynamics in their environment. She added that for educators in Berbice, it represents “renewed energy directed to revitalising the education sector through educators’ engagement with the highest standards of professional development in leadership, management, teaching and learning, innovation and research.”