All Nagaland School Teachers Association (ANSTA) will conduct its 40th Triennial Conference under the theme “Professional Renewal Towards Academic Excellence”, on November 1 and 2 at John Government Higher Secondary School Viswema.
Central ANSTA and Kohima Unit ANSTA will host the two day event.
The dignitaries for the planned event includes minister Road & Bridges, Tongpang Ozukum, advisor School Education, K. T. Sukhalu and also Menukhol John as special guest, guest speaker and resource person respectively.
Briefing media persons about the two day event at its office Friday afternoon, ANSTA president Ponchilo Wanth said the theme was selected based on the poor academic performance of government schools where the teachers alone were blamed.
Therefore, he said the ANSTA felt a need to review professional skills in line with the new system of education. Wanth said ANSTA intends to revive professional zeal and work with greater dedication.
Further, he said a brainstorming session on how to improve academic performance and on challenges faced by government teachers will be discussed and resolutions will be adopted for a way forward.
The second day will begin with a trek (Nature walk) to Dzukou Valley.
To queries on whether the absence of teachers for two days would affect students as final examinations were approaching, the officials responded that several rounds of consultations were held before fixing the dates and since one or two teachers from a school each would be attending, he hoped that it will not significantly impact school functioning.
Further Wanth said the teachers attending the conference will be granted special leave because the event was set after obtaining approval from the department.
To queries on poor performance of government schools and the practice of stationing proxy teachers, Wanth asserted that ANSTA completely opposes this practice. He said the association has informed all its member teachers to give up their jobs if they were unable to teach and open opportunities for the educated unemployed instead of occupying a seat without performing.
He admitted that insincerity of teachers was the reason for poor performance of the students, however, he said it was also a collective failure since many schools do not have Mathematics and Science subject teachers.
He therefore said a collective effort is required to ensure better performance in government schools in future.