NGO gets funds for teacher education programme

Muktangan, a non-government organisation (NGO), has been selected to receive Rs 3 crore from a philanthropic foundation for its teacher education programme.

Muktangan, a non-government organisation (NGO), has been selected to receive Rs 3 crore from a philanthropic foundation for its teacher education programme. Muktangan currently works in seven civic schools in the city as part of a public-private partnership between the municipal corporation and various NGOs.

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The philanthropic foundation, Dasra, conducted a six-month study of civic schools to identify the challenges they face and studied in detail the work of nine NGOs working in partnership with these schools.

Muktangan's model seeks to institutionalise its current professional teacher education programme to produce accredited English-medium teachers for civic schools. “We decided to invest in an organisation dealing with teachers; because if you can improve teachers then you can impact students,” said Deval Sanghavi, CEO of Dasra.

He refused to name the 10 philanthropists who have contributed but said they were from business backgrounds, established entrepreneurs and senior executives at financial institutions. Muktangan's teacher education model works on the basis of training teachers from local low-income communities so as to enable the communities and schools to foster a partnership.

The programme involves educating teachers for one year followed by ongoing development. The expanded programme will consist of one-year of pre-service training, two years of residency and subsequent on-going professional development. The course is designed to cover elements such as child observation, English language development, expanded elective courses and teacher placement in schools.

“Teacher education needs restructuring, the idea is that this model can bring in a totally new structure," said Elizabeth Mehta, founder-director of Muktangan.