Continuous Professional Development

In our higher education system, teachers do participate in short-term in-service trainings but empirical evidence has shown that such short-term activities have little impact on improving teaching practices in the classroom. Such short-term trainings prove insufficient and their contents do not meet the needs of colleges. Teachers need to be trained throughout their professional career. Their continuous professional development (CPD) is even more important in case where teachers have not done pre-service teacher education courses or induction trainings. CPD is a great tool to develop the skills needed to reach higher student learning outcomes. In HED Punjab, no mechanism has ever been evolved for the CPD of college teachers. Moreover, there is no institutionalization at the province or districts level that can implement CPD, and there is no follow-up mechanism to support teachers in the classroom.

The purpose of CPD is to update, develop and broaden the knowledge teachers acquired since their induction and/or to provide them with new skills and professional understanding.[1]. The promotion of CPD is also very much linked to the idea that colleges are valuable places for teachers’ learning. CPD may include heterogeneous activities such as workshops of trainers (preparation of new CPD content), college-based mentoring (study groups, courses), and combined professional development activities of same-subject teachers of neighbouring colleges at some central location.

The CPD activities ought to have coherence and be structured as a continuum of teacher's learning. CPD programmes are effective when they are based on college needs and allow interaction among teachers (peer-to-peer learning). CPD mechanism can guarantee a better coordination between experienced teachers, and the new teachers. The first group can offer their practical experience, and new teachers can share the latest novelty in teaching.

[1] OECD. (2005), Teachers matter: attracting, developing and retaining effective teachers. Paris: OECD

Publishing.

1. The College & reforms Section of HED, in coordination with DPI (Colleges), will launch the CPD programme for college teachers in a phase-wise manner. The first phase will focus on the college teachers and College Teaching Interns (CTIs) of the subjects of English, Physics, Biology, Chemistry, Mathematics, and Economics / Management services.

2. CPD programme will have a decentralised approach. For this,

i. Each district office will nominate one or more colleges as the cluster centres of the district. The cluster centres will be called Training Resource Centres (TRCs). The TRC will be at a central location, preferably within 15 kilometres from each college present in its cluster.

ii. Each district office will also nominate one District Subject Coordinator of each of the mentioned subjects for TRC. In cases where more than one TRCs have been identified, the district office will nominate the same number of District Subject Coordinators for each subject.

iii. Each District Subject Coordinator will be the in-charge of the CPD of his/her subject teachers in the colleges of located in the cluster of his/her TRC.

Functions of DPI (Colleges) Office

1. Supervision of PD/Mentoring days in all TRCs - may include monitoring visits to selected TRCs

2. Keeping attendance record of teachers / CTIs in PD/Mentoring-days.

3. Development of online server-based Learning Management System (LMS) for self-paced online courses of college teachers/CTIs - Successful completion of certain number of courses on LMS by a teacher / CTI would exempt him / her from attending a certain number of PD/Mentoring days.

Functions of Divisional Directors (Colleges)

1. Holding Biannual meetings with the Deputy Director (Colleges) of their districts – each meeting focusing the previous six-month’s PD/Mentoring days reports and the planning of next six-month’s PD -days

Functions of Deputy Directors (Colleges)

1. Identification of central college as the District TRCs - preferably within 15 kilometres from each college in the district - in the cases where a central college with 15 km distance from all colleges cannot be identified, the district may have more than one TRCs.

2. Selection of one District Subject Coordinator of each subjects for each TRC.

3. Leading the PD/Mentoring days through coordination with the Principals of colleges acting as TRCs and the District Subject Coordinators.

4. Receiving and keeping PD/Mentoring day reports and other record from District Subject Coordinators

5. Submitting the attendance along with vouched accounts to the DPI (Colleges) office on monthly basis

Functions of District Subject Coordinators

1. Organizing a monthly PD/Mentoring days at the TRC for the college teachers and CTIs of the colleges of cluster - from each college, half of the teachers and CTIs will attend PD/Mentoring day each month. In this way, each faculty member will attend the TRC one day in every alternate month.

The PD/Mentoring day, at TRCs, will be a 4 to 5 hours’ activity consisting of the following components.

• 50-60% time will be spent on the general andragogic modules - through interactive sessions by District Subject Coordinator.

• 40-50% of the PD/Mentoring day time will be spent on subject-based modules - through peer-to-peer learning (mentoring).

2. Development of reports of each PD/Mentoring day, on predefined format, and their submission to the Deputy Director (Colleges) of their districts.

3. Attending orientation training and biannual workshops at the province level

Functions of Principals of TRCs

1. Providing logistic support for monthly PD/Mentoring days of college faculty (6 rooms for 6 subjects).

2. Providing training resources & refreshment for trainees

Functions of College Teachers & CTIs

1. Attending a PD/Mentoring day on every alternate month - minimum 6 professional development days per year

2. Receiving follow-up and support of the District Subject Coordinators at their colleges

• Subject-based Peer-Learning (on the basis of real-time needs assessment)

• Pedagogy Vs Andragogy: Teaching to Adults & Bloom’s Taxonomy

• Assessment for Learning and Assessment of Learning

• Test Item Development - Practice

• Modern Learning Strategies: Blended Learning, Flipped Classroom, Adaptive Learning

• Motivating and Counselling Students & Mentoring

• Developing Reading Habits among Students

• Semester system - Prospects & Challenges

• Classroom Management

• Inclusive Education

• Life Skills Education

• Annual Activity Calendar - Academic & Co-Curricular Activities

• Planning & Designing a Research Study

• Communication Skills

• Development of Critical Thinking among students

• Use of LMS & Google Classroom for online education

• Use of Microsoft Teams and ZOOM for online education

• Use of IT in improving Classroom Instruction