Exchange programme for govt schoolteachers

In a first-of-its-kind, teachers from Urdu and Marathi-medium schools in Mumbai, rather than their counterparts from private schools, will be collaborating with teachers from the UK in a global exchange programme. 

After a visit to schools in the UK, a couple of officials from the school education department from the state have decided to include regional-medium schools along with other English-medium schools in this exchange programme.

UK’s Department of International Development’s (DFID) is funding the Global School Partnership programme. The first phase of the programme will start from the first week of November, when 16 head-teachers and two officials from the UK will visit schools in Mumbai.

Ruchira Ghosh from British Council, who is in charge of the exchange programme, said, “Since the schools participating from the UK are all government-funded schools, they wanted to be associated with the government schools in India.” Ghosh added, “The aim of the programme is to plan joint curriculum activities where the focus will be on global issues like environment, cultural diversity, and better understanding of each other’s culture.
They will jointly come up with ideas for students’ projects, future collaborations, etc.” The exchange programme, in the initial phase, is only meant for teachers, but will extend to students in the future.

One of the two officials who visited the UK was Suman Shinde, the education inspector from the South Mumbai zone. Shinde said, “They were interested in government and government-aided schools and we wanted regional-medium schools also to benefit from this scheme.”