Chairman of National Commission for Minorities, Naseem Ahmad, today batted for fresh training capsules to upgrade knowledge base and teaching skills.
"It is worrying that India does not have any world class institution of higher learning and that the key indicators of primary education were not encouraging," he said in a statement.
Ahmad was speaking at an international seminar on 'Teacher Education: Challenges, Opportunities and Strategies,' at Jamia Millia Islamia here.
He said,"The world is witnessing knowledge explosion but India is lagging behind in terms of quality and universal education. We are no doubt a great and upcoming nation, that being the position, we have far greater challenges compared to the developed countries."
Citing figures, he said, 39 per cent schools have less than 50 students while 21 per cent elementary school teachers are "untrained," and only 18 per cent teachers are able to avail annual in-service training.
"The world is witnessing knowledge explosion but India is lagging behind in terms of quality and universal education. We are no doubt a great and upcoming nation, that being the position, we have far greater challenges compared to the developed countries," Ahmed said.
More than the college and university teachers, it is the school teachers who face a crisis of identity, he said suggesting that they needed to be provided with "freshly thought training capsules" for updation of their knowledge base and teaching skills.
In the keynote address, Professor Joanna Madalinska-Michalak, University of Warsaw (Poland) termed developing teaching as a profession, a "global issue".
She suggested to work with the media to "lift the image" of teachers and the teaching profession, the statement added.
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