The State Council of Educational Research And Training (SCERT) will focus on improving teacher training in Delhi Government schools in order to improve quality education, Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia said on Thursday.

Speaking at a program organised on restructuring of SCERT and District Institute of Education and Training (DIET), Sisodia said that SCERT has to play a crucial role in teacher training.

“A country’s advancement in education depends only on the efforts of its teachers. This is the case in countries that are lauded for their quality education systems and it is because those countries have focused on developing and training their teachers.”

“We have to prepare teachers who can inculcate an inquisitive habit in our children and empower them to ask questions in the classrooms. The children should have the courage to demand truth and fill in the gaps of what they have learnt so far, he said, adding that only teachers can transform our society. It is then important to instil the right spirit in our teachers, and we can only achieve this through teacher training,” Sisodia said.

Sisodia said that the Delhi Government has also done a lot of work on teachers training in the last few years. “We have increased the posts and salaries in SCERT to instil a sense of respect for the talent that comes into the system. They’ve been given the UGC-scale pays. Delhi is the only State in this country where SCERT is given this scale and honour,” he added.

The Government of Delhi has increased the number of academic faculty posts in SCERT and DIET from 240 to more than 700. “This will make it possible for these institutions to fulfil their objectives and also perform better. Delhi is the only State which has increased the pay scale in SCERT and DIET to bring it at par with NCERT” Sisodia said.