With online platforms, teacher training at all 19 centres now more effective- Acting Principal 

Acting Principal of the Cyril Potter College of Education (CPCE) Noella Joseph says teachers’ access to training at all 19 centres improved since the institution went online.

Joseph was addressing the improvements of the institution during the Education Ministry’s “Education Spotlight” programme on Wednesday evening.

“Offering our services fully online and becoming equipped as much as possible to make sure we reach out to all our candidates, especially the service candidates, for them to be professionally trained, was quite commendable,” she stated.

Joseph added: “We had to implement it [online classes] and we really embraced that because we are able now to reach all out students in all 19 centres across our country.”

She shared that prior to going online, the lecturers had to move from one centre to another when there were shortages.

“…we now have the ability that if we have a course being offered at Anna Regina Centre but someone in Moruca doesn’t have a lecturer for that particular course…that lecturer can accommodate a class or a course in another region. So we’re not restricted to physical space anymore – which is a great improvement,” Joseph said.

In 2021, Minister of Education Priya Manickchand announced that CPCE was being offered as a full online school to train teachers who cannot access its physical facilities.

Meanwhile, she said the Education Ministry has her support to reach the aim of having 100 per cent trained teachers in every classroom by 2025.

“Our major role for CPCE in Guyana and by extension abroad is for us to train teachers to be professional educators and we have,” she stated.

“That is part of our strategic plan in the Ministry of Education’s strategic plan [that] by 2025, we must have 100 per cent trained teachers in our classrooms,” she stated.

Teachers who are trained at the institution receive training that focuses on specialisation on core courses. This is to ensure the students receive the best possible teaching. The teachers are given lectures that expound on how to respond to different needs of the children so they can have a professional understanding of how to effectively teach every child.

“Our teachers, when they are here, they have a professional touch that they can even reach to a child who, under normal circumstances, may not be able to learn effectively because of what is happening at home and other places,

“We give them courses to equip our teachers to make sure that every child in our classroom is properly trained and taken care of,” she explained.

Among the programmes offered are the early childhood programme for both pre-service and in-service students, primary programme and secondary academic and pre-vocational programmes. Overall there are four programmes for the Associates Degree in Education (ADE). For teachers who are not eligible for the ADE programme there is the Trained Teacher Certificate (TTC) programme.