The compulsion of Teacher Eligibility Test (TET) level II qualification for appearing in the examination for selection of 2,658 posts of lecturer Teachers (lT) is baffling many job aspirants here. The Uttarakhand Board of Technical Education Roorkee (UBTER) had recently invited application forms for filling the vacant lT posts in the State.
The Section 23 of Right to Education (RTE) Act had made a provision of TET qualification for selection of teachers for Class I to VIII. The Act makes it mandatory to qualify the level I of TET for appointments of teachers in the primary classes while level II of TET was made compulsory for the selection of teachers in the classes VI to VIII. Many aspirants of the jobs in the lT cadre were surprised when the UBTER released the notification for the recruitment process; they were hoping that since the lecturer teachers teach the Classes IX and X, the TET compulsion would not be there. Sangeeta Kulashree, one of the Bachelor of Education (B.Ed.) qualified candidates, told The Pioneer that she was well prepared for the examination, but the job advertisement has shattered her hopes of getting job as she is now not eligible for applying. She said that she did not apply for Uttarakhand Teacher Eligibility Test (UTET) level II last year as she was told that it is not required for lecturer grade, adding that no other State has this compulsion of level II qualification for lecturers. She said that the Government should either shelve the compulsion of TET level II in lT recruitment or should at least wait for the result of Central Teacher Eligibility test (CTET) conducted last month.
When contacted the Additional director Secondary education NK Bahuguna told The Pioneer that the National Council of Teachers Education (NCTE) directive states that the TET level II is compulsory for recruitment in lT cadre of those intermediate and high schools where the classes for VI- VIII are also there. He said that since the lecturer teachers also teach the classes VI to VIII apart from IX and X classes in these schools the TET level II qualification is mandatory.
The State of Uttarakhand has many inter colleges without the middle classes (VI to VIII); it means that the lT teachers in these schools do not need the additional qualification of TET-- as per the norms of NCTE -- as demanded in the recruitment advertisement.
