Awards for efficient primary teachers in offing

To bring more reformation in primary education sector, the State Government has decided to award good performing teachers and functionaries working at the field level.A decision to this effect was taken at a executive committee meeting of the Odisha Primary Education Programme Authority (OPEPA) held under chairmanship of Chief Secretary GC Pati at the State Secretariat here on Wednesday. School and Mass Education Usha Padhi and Additional Chief Secretary, Finance, R Balkrishnan were present.

It was decided to take up third party concurrent evaluation of the OPEPA programmes along with improvement in teaching and learning outcomes with introduction of technology-enabled teaching-learning system developed by IIT, Madras.The Chief Secretary asked the department to coin an appropriate title under which good performing teachers and field functionaries would be awarded.

Department Secretary Padhi said the textbooks and other e-contents for Class-1 to X would be made available in eBasta in phased manner with technical assistance from Center for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC). The books would be available in popular digital formats such as ePub, kindle, ipad and pdf.

The books would be available to teachers, students, guardians and schools free of cost. Students can download the textbooks and other e-contents on their devices like tablets, smart phones or pen drives.Besides, it was decided to strengthen the video-conferencing system of the OPEPA. Various subject experts and scientists of national and international repute coming to Bhubaneswar can also be scheduled to talk with teachers and students through the video-conferencing in order to provide wider exposure for the students in Government schools.

It was revealed that nearly 100 per cent of SSA funds amounting to `1377.16 crore had been spent in 2014-15 and an Annual A Plan (AWP) of `2321 has been set for the current fiscal. The major interventions in the AAPlan include construction of toilets, residential hostels, transport and escort facility, special training, seasonal hostel, free textbooks, free uniform, teachers training and girl child education.