New Delhi: The Ministry of Human Resource Development has launched a major and unique initiative of online professional development of 1.5 million higher education faculty using the MOOCs platform SWAYAM. In the first phase, 75 discipline-specific National Resource Centres have been identified which are tasked to prepare online training material with focus on latest developments in the discipline, new & emerging trends, pedagogical improvements and methodologies for transacting revised curriculum.

A varied set of institutions such as, Centres under the Ministry’s Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya National Mission on Teachers and Teaching (PMMMNMTT) located in Central Universities, IISc, IUCAA, IITs, IISERs, NITs, State Universities ; UGC’s Human Resource Development Centres( HRDCs), National Institutes for Technical Teachers Training (NITTTRs), IIITs, Open Universities have been notified as NRCs.

These NRCs cover wide ranging disciplines of Social Sciences, Sciences, Engineering and Technology, Design & Manufacturing, Humanities, Language Teaching, Commerce, Management, Education Planning and Administration, Public Policy, Leadership & Governance, Library & Information Science, Astronomy & Astrophysics, Assessment and Evaluation, Pedagogy and research methods , cutting edge areas of Nano-sciences, Internet of  Things, etc.

Under this initiative, all in-service teachers, irrespective of their subject and seniority will have an enabling opportunity to keep abreast of the latest developments in their disciplines through the technology based online refresher course. The NRCs will develop the Refresher Module which will include the latest trends in their earmarked discipline by 15th June each year.

The training materials will be uploaded and made available through SWAYAM to all the teachers w.e.f. 1st October each year and based on the response, the course can be repeated in the following January. NRC will publish the list of the faculty who have been certified by 31st December, 2018. UGC will issue order/regulations for the purpose of Career Progression and APIs.

Faculty can benefit from this initiative as it is highly flexible and can be done at one’s own pace and time. The NRCs will revolutionize professional development of faculty by catering to massive numbers by leveraging ICT and online technology platform of SWAYAM.