KARACHI, May 27: The final phase of training of about 3200 teachers, titled “In-service Training Programme for Master Trainers” under the Sindh Middle School Project started at the National Institute of Public Administration (Nipa) here on Monday.

Over 80 master trainers from rural and urban areas of the province will be trained, who will then impart teaching techniques to more than 2084 head teachers belonging to all city districts of the province.

All the master trainers selected from seven districts of Sindh, including Hyderabad, Thatta, Badin, Mirpurkhas, Sanghar, Tharparkar and Karachi, are being trained in two groups. The second phase is under way at the IBA, Sukkur.

Giving details of the training programme, an official of the Middle School Project said a team of nine foreign-qualified and experienced officials of Sindh Education Department had been invited to conduct the training.

The team of officials, who will deliver lectures and impart training during the two-week workshop, have been selected from various cities of Sindh which consisted of district officers, head mistresses, account officers, supervisors of elementary education and ADOs.

The teachers’ training programme titled “Training of Teachers and Organizers in Profession” has been initiated by the Education Department to produce trained teaching faculties, who would in turn train teachers in rural and slum areas of the province.

The Sindh Middle Schools Project is being operated by financial assistance from the Asian Development Bank, which is also providing funds for many other projects, aimed at rural literacy enhancement.

About 96 educational officials have been chosen from various districts of the province to look after the academic supervision programme for training of 13,105 more teachers. In the first phase of academic supervision, these district educational officials would train 156 master trainers, who in turn would impart teaching training to some 2,084 teachers in the next phase.

All the phases of the training started simultaneously in the province as per decision taken at an educational conference held on July 4, 2001, the official said, adding that the ADB management had already released funds for the first phase of the programme.

In the latter phase, which has also been divided into two parts, 480 master trainers would receive training in linguistic subjects, including Urdu, Sindhi, English, Social Studies, Science and Mathematics.

During another programme, titled: Development of Achievement Testing, teachers who have received training from abroad on modern methods, would impart training to 120 teachers, who in turn would supervise the latter teachers training programmes.

These programmes would not only help the district organizers to supervise and guide heads of educational institutions about latest techniques of teaching, but would also promote educational environment in rural areas.

In addition, the Sindh government in collaboration with the ADB has started another project to provide stipends to girl students, who are studying in 6th, 7th and 8th classes and girl students of HSC part-I&II.

Approximately, the government has distributed over Rs48.302 million among the girl students at a rate of Rs1470 per student annually while another 500 women teachers have been so far paid Rs3,412 annually under their faculty-strengthening programme.—PPI