Teacher education needs a structural change
Practising
teachers will need an enabling and empowering environment where they are
treated as valued professionals
Another
Teachers’ Day has gone by on 5 September. Newspapers and social media have, as
every year, reported speeches extolling the virtues of the profession and
expressions of gratitude. Some companies have used the occasion to sell their
wares, tapping into the warm and fuzzy feeling about teachers that all this
evokes. This admiration for the profession is strangely absent the rest of the
year. Teachers are more often than not seen as the cause of the problems in
education, deserving of derision. Securely employed, often absent, and not
committed to their jobs—so goes the popular narrative about
teachers.
teachers.
This
contradiction arises from a mix of three kinds of factors, and their
interaction. First, the expression of goodwill is intended for specific teachers.
These are often “my teachers” and “teachers of my children”, the bad ones are
the large numbers who teach the vast masses, mostly in government schools.
Second, some of the goodwill is a homage to the notion of the ideal teacher,
and a lament for what should be, but is not. Third, teachers as a group are
assigned the primary blame for the ills of the education system.
Let’s
look at the third factor more closely. Public advocacy has certainly succeeded
over the past 15 years in elevating quality as the most important issue in
education in India. The simple (perhaps simplistic) analysis of the issue
begins by noting that children in schools are not learning what they should,
i.e., to read, write and do basic math. From the statement of this problem, most
people jump quickly to what seems to them to be logical, unfortunately using
information selectively.
The
first step in this analysis is the idea that since most children are in school
across India and have teachers, the reason for poor learning outcomes can only
be ineffective teaching and teachers. Why so? The rough and ready explanation
is: The people involved must not be working adequately and perhaps are not
competent enough for the job. This is a faulty and largely false diagnosis. Why
is it then so influential?
There
are media stories, studies and popular anecdotes that convince people about the
validity of their analysis. All reports, studies and arguments counter to this
narrative are ignored completely. This is the classic phenomenon of selective
cognition to confirm a theory, while discounting and rationalizing facts that
don’t fit the theory. This particular theory is deeply satisfying because it
has a sense of closure, and a group to hold responsible for the mess in our
school education. A phenomenon called scapegoating.
The
reality is that teachers are not any different from any large workforce group.
With eight million teachers, it cannot be any other way, unless they are
particularly chosen with great care to be shirkers, which they certainly are
not. Much like the workforce groups of IT professionals or accountants, their
effort in their role is distributed along a curve. Some put in enormous amount
of effort, some not at all, and most will try to do an honest day’s work every
day. If anything, teachers work harder, and that too under more trying
circumstances. This is simply because they deal with children for whom deep
down they feel responsible, and that is a feeling most cannot ignore. Their
efforts are also certainly influenced by their local and systemic conditions.
Capacity
is also distributed along a curve for teachers. But here lies one of the key
issues. Our deeply flawed teacher education system doesn’t prepare our teachers
with the capacities needed for their roles. So this whole capacity curve is
below what is required. The very design of our teacher education system ensures
such a perverse outcome. This obviously is not the fault of the teachers. In
fact, practising teachers often want to learn and develop themselves since they
frequently encounter situations where they find themselves inadequately
prepared. Blaming teachers for this overall situation in capacity is not just
wrong but unjust. Those who have determined the course of teacher education are
responsible for this deep systemic inadequacy.
But
this counter-analysis (as it were) cannot give the sense of satisfaction that
comes from scapegoating. And so people, including the average person on the
road, businesspeople, many ministers and officials, and the talking heads on television,
find it easier to blame the teachers. And this scapegoating feeds a spiral of
negativity against teachers, who, far from feeling valued, feel under siege.
Teachers’
capacity and their effectiveness need to improve. But that will happen only
with structural and systemic changes in teacher education and professional
development. Practising teachers will need an enabling and empowering
environment where they are treated as valued professionals. And organizational
changes in school systems and curricular reform will also need to happen. Till
then, the least we can do is to not scapegoat teachers and stop repeating
stories that confirm our biases. And that will really give teachers their due
on Teachers’ Day.
Regards
Pralhad Jadhav
Senior Manager @ Library
Khaitan & Co
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