ISLAMABAD, Aug 7: The Higher Education Commission (HEC) chairman, Dr Attaur Rehman, on Saturday directed the vice- chancellors of public-sector universities to get their teachers trained under its programme 'Train the Trainers' with the objective of improving teaching standards.
He was speaking as chief guest at the Pakistan Educational Research Network (PERN) website launching ceremony.
Speaking on the occasion, he said: "I have formally asked vice-chancellors to get their teachers trained under the project with the help of the commission so that they could further spread the skill in their respective campuses."
PERN is part of the overall vision and objectives of National Information Technology (IT) plan of action, Dr Attaur Rehman said.
The project has been financed by the government in closer cooperation with Pakistan Telecommunication Company (PTCL) research and development funds.
He said this project was aimed to be an integral part of the overall education system of the country and was designed to interlink all public/private sector chartered universities/degree awarding institutes registered with the Higher Education Commission.
The network design of PERN consists of three nodal points at Islamabad, Lahore and Karachi and these three nodal locations are interconnected on existing fibre system and terminate the internet facility in a pool.
This project allows institutions to pool resources with each other through national fibre network and to access internet from the respective nodal points.
While highlighting the services offered by PERN, Dr Ata mentioned that presently PERN would provide access through internet bandwidth; to over 11,000 scientific journals, four or more public IP addresses for use by the university, broadband link to other universities and infrastructure for point to point video-conferencing.
At the end, Dr Attaur Rahman distributed shields and certificates among successful candidates responsible for launching this project.
Teachers training stressed: Training of teachers in line with technological advances and ever-changing curriculum is need of the hour.
This was stated by Comsats adviser Dr Shahzad Ahmad Mufti while speaking as the chief guest at the concluding ceremony of workshop on biotechnology and bioinformatics here on Saturday.
The five-day workshop was organized by the biochemistry department of University of Arid Agriculture (UAA) in collaboration with the Higher Education Commission (HEC).
Congratulating the participants of the workshop, Dr Mufti said: "We want teachers to be able to keep pace with ever- changing scientific developments and comprehend new concepts of teaching in the world."
Stressing on the methodology of teaching, he impressed upon the participating teachers to leave passive kind of teaching and bring a positive change in the their teaching styles.
Speaking on the occasion, UAA's Dean Faculty of Crop and Food Sciences Dr Mushtaq Ahmad Khan said the government had taken initiatives for the development of science subjects curriculum almost at all levels.
"I hope this conference would help the participating teachers to upgrade their teaching skills with incorporation of new ideas and methodologies," he added.
The main objective of the workshop was to train the young scientist, academician and research students, besides equipping them with advanced teaching techniques in biochemistry, molecular biology, genetic engineering and biotechnology for carrying out teaching programmes successfully and developing scientific linkage between the higher institutions, he said.
Department of Biochemistry chairperson Dr Azra Khanum appreciated the active participation of teachers in the workshop.
She said it had been envisaged that the workshop would equip the teaching community with advance knowledge in the field of biology and its branches.
This indigenous effort would also help mobilize the scientific community to develop a science culture within the society to play their role in the developing phase of the nation, she added.
The workshop comprised a series of lecturers followed by laboratory work for practical needs. The experts delivered detailed orientations on the topics like genetics and genetic engineering, molecular biology of cell, proteins and enzymes, gene therapy and bioinformatics.
On the occasion, the chief guest distributed certificates among the participants belonging to different colleges of the twin cities.