Pune: Maharashtra State Faculty Development Authority (MSFDA) has trained around 22,000 teachers from aided colleges so far and plans to train another 10,000 over the next year, its executive director, Shailendra Devlankar, said on Monday.
For new teachers, we offer a one-month induction programme, while for in-service teachers, the training can range from one day to a week to a month, as the need be,” he said. “These will be compiled and published so that every student, whether she lives in a city or village, gets gainful internships within their locality, without unnecessarily wasting money,” Devlankar said. He claimed that MSFDA was the only institute in the country that trains in-service college teachers. “We have teacher training for school teachers, but when it comes to college teachers, training is limited and mostly restricted to what is needed for promotions within the job. But we train college teachers in the latest topics. Need-based training is also provided when institutes demand it.
The institute recently trained 1,231 college teachers as counsellors. “Once this is done, which we hope to complete within this year, we will start training college teachers in private institutes too. “There are rising cases of drug addiction among college students. Mental health is also gaining importance. We need teachers to be able to help and support students. So, these master trainers have been trained. The aim is that they will transfer the knowledge to their colleagues,” he added.