Teacher Empowerment

TEACHER EMPOWERMENT

The entire essence of education and the role of teacher in education lies in the evolution of a blue deeper than the indigo itself. That is, object of all activity is the learner and his development, which needs to be a step further from the teacher himself.

Herein comes the indispensable role of a teacher in selflessly taking the students to a much higher degree and the need for empowerment of the teachers.

Keeping in mind the principle of cause and effect, the cause of shaping the lives of learners in the restricted area of classroom will only take effect once the teacher is empowered to freely exploit all creativity he desires.

Let us now take a closer look at what we mean by empowerment where both students and teachers share an equal right to voice their opinions.

Questions critical of how power is subtly held or denied in the fields of organized education have bothered many thinkers. If it were mearly a question of an equal sharing of power for the sake of egalitarianism, it would not be serious matter. But there might be power insidiously exercised to keep the consumers of education in a state of dependence, and ignorance of what rightfully belongs to them, what they can achieve, and how they can seek their own emancipation.

Is our education like this? Does it certainly impose on its consumers, the ideology, the beliefs and the values system of the classes that control it. Don’t they try to perpetuate through the system of education their privileged status and incapacitate others? These are large questions.

What is the role of education?

The role of education as per our national policy is:

· empowering through knowledge and skills &
· imparting values

If these two dimensions are to be met, then teachers should be empowered to cater to these two dimensions.

How do you equip the teachers with knowledge and skill? Or in other word. How do you empower them to meet this national goal?

When we talk of empowerment and equipping of teachers, we talk of providing them knowledge, skills and values and we also teach them how to use these skills in their profession.


Generally, to empower is to allow participation and give equal power in decision making to all the affecting sections especially to those who have traditionally being kept out. The teacher empowerment might, among other things, mean giving power to the teacher to decide what will be taught, and how.

It may be noted in this context that curricular decisions have traditionally being taken at the top. These along with ideologies under pinning them have, by and large been imposed on those at the lower rungs. Thus, in general terms, empowerment has to be with such things as:

· Sharing of power
· Right to participate
· Right to articulate oneself and be heard
· Equality
· Representation &
· Accommodation

It is to be noted that the prevailing educational system subscribes to the `banking concept' - the concept that the teacher is a repository of (all) knowledge and its sole dispenser, and the learner the recipient. There is transfer of knowledge from the teacher to the learner - a one-way process that places the learner at the `receiving end.' Teachers enjoy being looked up as know-it-alls, and the learners' expectations have, through the ages, got conditioned accordingly. This is doubly disempowering - it breeds learner-dependence, and incapacitates them, indirectly damaging their self-confidence. They begin grossly underestimating their cognitive resourcefulness. They cannot believe that they carry with them knowledge and experience with which they can discover and create knowledge for themselves.

So there is a need for empowerment everywhere:

¨ Empowerment of schools with equipment and aids to teaching;
¨ Of teachers with good pronunciation, proficiency; &
¨ Skills of teaching of learners with self-confidence and faith in their own native abilities and learning resources.

In the school environment the school authorities should, to some extent, decentralise decision- making. This step would curtail opportunists from hogging the most lucrative decisions from the decision-makers. This empowerment would increase interaction between teachers and would result in collaborative effort in the teaching learning process. It would also make them believe that they can do their job well, and that they are capable of transacting the right content to the right learner in the right way.

With the lucrative new age means of communication learning will soon begin to be manipulated by the learner himself. This is where the empowerment of teachers will come in picture. The teachers have to be suitably equipped to channalise the growing technology into an aid rather than an intimidating factor.

Some of the questions which empowerment of teachers will answer are:

Ø Firstly, curriculum rigidity that is the teacher needs the power to incorporate other extra elements in the curriculum to enhance the creativity in learning.
Ø Secondly, administrative control, this means the teacher needs to take control of the methodology of teaching that best suits each class as we cannot forget that the teacher knows her students best.
Ø Thirdly, decision making capability, where the teacher needs to take the stand as a leader and given freedom to innovate new instructional strategies. The flip side of this empowerment would of course entail realization of the subtle difference between the duties, responsibilities and rights of teachers.

It gives the teacher certain rights like: those of academic freedom or in other words we are trying to give freedom of action to teachers (autonomy) yet at the same time placing responsibilities as well as accountability on them.

It is known that “you get the government you deserve”. Here this means that the journey of a teacher is about striving to be worthy of the responsibilities that empowerment entails. To conclude the honours is on each one of us to prove deserving of that empowerment.