Build the future: Invest in teachers now

TEACHERS, since 1994, have observed World Teachers' Day on October 5. The aim is to mobilise support for teachers and ensure that the needs of future generations continue to be met by teachers. According to Unesco, World Teachers' Day represents the awareness, understanding and appreciation displayed for the vital contribution that teachers make to education and development.
In Bangladesh, the National Front of Teachers and Employees (NFTE), the largest united platform of eleven associations and unions representing half a million teachers and education employees who serve in about 30 thousand educational institutions, observes the day through rallies, discussion meetings, and distribution of printed articles and write-ups highlighting teachers' status, dignity and role in improving the standard of education.
This year the NFTE has drawn up a new program for the 64 administrative districts of the country, paying respect to elderly and retired teachers who contributed to education as teachers and textbook writers.
This year, World Teachers' Day puts the spotlight on the global teacher shortage and the challenges of being a teacher today. In our rapidly changing and interdependent world, teachers have to ensure that students not only acquire solid skills in basic subjects, but also become responsible local and global citizens, at ease with new technologies, and able to make informed decisions about healthcare, the environment and other challenges.
It is relevant to point out that sustained investment is required to develop a well-trained and motivated teaching force. It is critical that governments support the recruitment, training and professional development of teachers. These concerns are reflected in this year's main theme: "Build the future: invest in teachers now!"
October 5 is a day of celebration for the teaching community throughout the globe in view of Unesco's adoption of the recommendations concerning the status of teachers at a special intergovernmental conference in Paris on that day in 1966, which were later approved by ILO. The recommendations are immensely important due to their wide ranging significance and implications in regard to educators in particular and education in general.
Four of its salient features are:
-Since education is a service of fundamental importance, it should be recognised as a responsibility of the state;
-Teachers' organisations should be recognised as a force which can contribute greatly to educational advancement and which, therefore, should be associated with the determination of education policy;
-Since education is an essential factor in economic growth, educational planning should form an integral part of total economic and social planning undertaken to improve living conditions;
-Teachers' salaries should: i) reflect the importance to society of the teaching function and hence the importance of teachers; ii) compare favourably with salaries paid in other occupations requiring similar or equivalent qualifications; iii) provide teachers with the means to ensure a reasonable standard of living for themselves and their families as well as to invest in further education or in the pursuit of cultural activities thus enhancing their professional qualification.
Since 1994, the Bangladesh College Teachers' Association (BCTA) and Bangladesh Federation of Teachers Associations (BFTA) have initiated and pioneered the observation of this day. This year, the National Front of Teachers & Employees (NFTE) has drawn some new programs. However, World Teachers' Day,2009 has a new perspective in Bangladesh. Within a short time of the formation of the new government, an eighteen-member National Education Policy Formulation Committee was formed.
The Committee has already submitted its report, which includes, among other aspects, recommendations to enhance teachers' salaries, status and dignity, as well as their pre-service and in-service training, regularly update the curriculum, put stress on science and job-oriented technical and vocational education, introduce common core subjects in all strata of education, in both Bengali and English medium schools, establish an equivalent number of technical and vocational schools and madrasas, and enact service conditions for education employees.
It is heartening to note that the present government has enhanced the salaries of non-government primary teachers, keeping their pay at par with the basic pay of government primary teachers. Non-government school, college, madrasa and vocational institution teachers will also be included in the new national pay scale, as per an announcement made by the education minister. All these positive steps and approaches, however, neither mitigates nor solves all the chronic professional and academic ailments accumulated over the years.
But the positive trend on the part of the present government indicates that it has started a process of dialogue and consultation with teachers' organisations on matters of education and issues that concern teachers and education employees. The Non-Government Teachers & Employees Welfare Trust Fund Committee and Teachers & Employees Retirement Benefit Board have already been reconstituted.
Yet, in spite of these positive approaches from the government, seventy thousand teachers and employees are on the waiting list to receive their due salaries. The time/promotion scale which teachers received at the end of two and eight years, discontinued by the earlier government, is yet to be resumed, though a high-powered committee headed by the prime minister's adviser on education, social development and political affairs, Professor Dr. Alauddin Ahmed, and the Parliamentary Standing Committee on education have already recommended it.
It is a day to celebrate teachers and the central role they play in guiding children, youth and adults through a life-long learning process. This year, World Teachers' Day focuses on the role of teachers within the context of the global financial and economic crisis and the need to invest in teachers now as a means to secure post-crisis regeneration. All concerned, from top to bottom, should recognise that it is the teaching force with its knowledge, experience and foresight that can bring new insight into global solutions.

Professor Quazi Faruque Ahmed is the Chief-coordinator, NFTE Bangladesh, and Secretary General, Bangladesh Federation of Teachers' Associations (BFTA). E-mail: [email protected]