Managements of hundreds of stand-alone B.Ed. colleges in the State are understandably in a quandary in the wake of the concurrence given by the government to the Tamil Nadu Teacher Education University (TNTEU) to introduce four-year integrated programs from 2020-21.
The TNTEU has proposed to introduce two four-year integrated teacher education programmes: one for pre-primary to primary, and the other for upper-primary to secondary, as per NCTE (National Council for Teacher Education) Amendment Regulation 2018.
The amendment was brought in after the Ministry of Human Resource Development announced scrapping of B.Ed. and replacing it with B.Sc. Ed. and B.A. Ed. programmes.
The TNTEU which has 718 affiliated Colleges of Education, including seven Government, 14 Government aided and 697 self financing Colleges of Education in its fold is awaiting NCTE approval for starting the four-year integrated teacher education programme at the newly-constructed constituent colleges at Edappadi in Salem district and V. Maruthur in Villupuram district.
So far, 12 colleges in Tamil Nadu have been offering B.Sc. B.Ed. programme.
Stress on quality
The MHRD believes that the four-year integrated programs will improve the quality of teachers and teaching, and will place the programme on a par with other professions such as medicine.
But, there is no word yet on whether those pursuing the integrated programme will be exempted from the teacher eligibility tests, to get into the profession.
Time saved
The four-year integrated course, when implemented, will save the aspirants one year since they can join it right after their Class 12, against the current system of first doing graduation and then the two-year B.Ed.
Going by the NCTE guidelines, stand-alone B.Ed. colleges are at a disadvantage since only those institutions that already have undergraduate programmes can offer the four-year integrated teacher education programmes, N. Senthilnathan, Associate Professor, Department of Educational Technology, Bharathidasan University, said.
According to a functionary of a private college, the programme will be a double whammy since the stand-alone institutions were already suffering from lack of admissions with B.Ed. losing sheen after being converted into a two-year programme.
