Rural stint a must for aspiring teachers

All those opting for BEd and other similar teaching programmes will have to do an internship of 20 weeks and they will be assigned schools in rural areas for this purpose too. This will help them understand the challenges.

A SENIOR HRD OFFICIAL

NEW DEELHI: Teaching in rural areas will soon be mandatory for aspiring teachers, with the human resource development (HRD) ministry setting up a committee for the purpose to work out the modalities.

According to a senior HRD official, students enrolled in teaching courses will have to teach in rural areas too as part of their training programmes.

The National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE), which is mandated with maintaining teacher education standards in the country, had revised its regulations, increasing the duration of the BEd programme from one year to two years from the academic session 2015-16.

In this, a provision for 20 weeks of internship was introduced. The ministry is now planning to introduce teaching at rural areas as part of that internship.

“All those opting for BEd and other similar teaching programmes will have to do an internship of 20 weeks and they will be assigned schools in rural areas for this purpose too. This will help them understand what the challenges are in rural areas and this will serve as a more rigorous training programme,” said a senior HRD official.

The ministry’s department of school education is also looking to examine a proposal under which all those teachers who have taught in urban areas for at least 15 years will be transferred to rural areas. The move is aimed at improving the teaching standards in rural areas as not many teachers opt for these places willingly.

The issue was discussed at a meeting by PM Narendra Modi on March 11, wherein he had reviewed the education sector.