By Phuntsok Yangchen
DHARAMSHALA, September 5: The Department of Education of Tibetan government in exile today on Teachers’ Day launched its first ever teacher professional development website www.tibetanteachers.com to make educational resources easily accessible for teachers to advance their skills.
The website contains educational resources for teachers and provides a platform to share their knowledge and experience with other teachers.
“Creating this website for our teachers is a part of Teacher Professional Development programme- a major educational project recently undertaken by the Department of Education which endorses the new paradigms in teacher professional development practices,” said Department of Education in its press release. “The new paradigms emphasize the need for teacher-led, collaborative, continuous and school-based interventions rather than centralized, one-off trainings.”
DoE hopes that the website would bring change in school culture and make collaborative as well as personal effort by teachers to improve their classroom practice.
Ngodup Tsering, Secretary of Departmnent of Education thanked all the teachers for their work and contribution to the society. He said today coinciding with Teachers’ day, “In the field of education, people around the world agrees that teachers play the most important role and we must be grateful for them.”
Under its Teacher Professional Development Programme, DoE has formulated Teacher Professional manual for Tibetan schools in India and Nepal, provided workshops for the school heads on Teacher Professional Development, introduced various collaborative practices and installed teacher’s reading corner in 11 pilot schools.
In line with the 14th Tibetan cabinet’s prioritization of education and academic excellence, the exile government has held a number of training for students and teachers since 2011.
The Department of Education currently oversees 73 Tibetan schools – excluding the pre-primary sections and private schools – in India and Nepal under different autonomous administrative bodies. There are around 24,000 students and 2,200 staff members in these schools.
