Union Education Minister Pralhad Joshi emphasized on Monday that the quality of education is fundamentally linked to the competence and empathy of teachers. He pointed out their crucial role in executing the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020, which aims to transform India into a ‘Viksit Bharat’ by 2047.
Addressing the National Council for Teacher Education’s (NCTE) 32nd Foundation Day celebrations through a video message, Joshi said, “Educational quality rests on the competence and empathy of our teachers” and highlighted the role of the four-year undergraduate Integrated Teacher Education Programme (ITEP) course in teacher preparation. On the use of artificial intelligence in teacher education, Joshi said it should be leveraged responsibly to improve teaching while retaining the human element. “AI should enrich pedagogy without replacing essential human values,” he said. NCTE’s foundation day celebrations at Gautam Buddha University, Greater Noida, were held alongside a national conference on ITEP, themed “Reflection, Reform and Future Readiness”, with more than 400 ITEP institutions participating in hybrid mode.
