AIOU’s Virtual Teachers Training Academy to equip teachers across Pakistan”: Raja Rashid

ISLAMABAD, FEB 16 (DNA) – The Virtual Teachers Training Academy Portal established at the Lahore Regional Centre of the Allama Iqbal Open University ) AIOU) will be available to teachers across Pakistan and will go a long way in eliminating physical barriers hindering the professional development of teachers, said Prof. Dr. Zia Ul-Qayyum, Vice Chancellor AIOU at the inaugural ceremony of the Portal today (Tuesday).

Raja Rashid Hafeez, Provincial Minister for Literacy and Non-Formal Basic Education was chief quest at while amongst others Secretary Literacy and Non-Formal Basic Education Department, Punjab, Waqas Ali Mahmood, Prof. Dr. Nasir Mahmood, Dean, Faculty of Education AIOU, Senior Education Advisor JICA-AQAL II Abid Gill, Dr. Shafqat Ali of National Commission for Human Development, Deputy Chief of Party of ALIGHT Pakistan, Kamran Iftikhar Lone, Raja Umer Younis, Director Coordination and Follow-up, AIOU, and Dr. Zahid Majeed were also present on this occasion. The Virtual Teachers Training Academy Portal has been jointly envisaged and established by AIOU, JICA, and ALIGHT, Pakistan.

Speaking at the ceremony the Provincial Minister, Raja Rasheed hoped that the Virtual Teachers Training Academy will go a long way in equipping teachers in far flung areas with the latest pedagogical skills and content knowledge leading to quality blended education of the pupils in non-formal schools and literacy. He lauded the services of AIOU in promotion of education in the country, and commended the efforts of Prof. Dr Zia for digitalization of the AIOU. He viewed that this the age of technology and every institution has to adopt the latest technology otherwise it will lag behind its competitors.

Professor Dr Zia Ul-Qayyum while explaining about the Portal said that, “it is basically a learning management system which includes content, quality videos, learning activities, assessment and feedback policy to achieve standard training performances of the teachers living across the country, especially the far flung areas. He said that AIOU soon all operations of the AIOU will be transferred to automated mode, and the university will be fully digitalized by July 2021, he hoped. The teachers residing in far off areas with no internet facilities will be able to avail the offline facility and manuals will be delivered to them via post or email to enhance their professional development and create a holistic teaching experience to engage students in activity based teaching, he added.

Deputy Chief of Party of ALIGHT Pakistan Kamran Iftikhar Lone appreciated AIOU for support in the development of the portal and training content/modules, which will help ensure that our educators and learners are primed for success. He said that this training portal will cater to the training needs of Non-Formal Education (NFE) teachers following formal or Accelerated Learning Programme (ALP) curriculum and teachers of adult literacy programme.