Teacher's day: PM Modi to felicitate national award-winning teachers

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will felicitate national award-winning teachers today, ahead of Teachers’ Day celebrated on September 5.  Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu will confer National Awards for 2017 on the teachers on September 5.  The teachers were selected under a revised guidelines aimed at selecting those who had shown innovation in their work and had added value to the school and to their students, according to a government statement.

“The number of awardees was brought down to just 45 as this was necessary to restore the prestige of the awards. Under the earlier scheme, the number of awardees had crossed 300,” the statement said.

The nominated teachers gave a presentation last month before an independent jury comprising a senior educationist. This ensured that all of them were given an opportunity to place before the jury their contribution and the work done by them, the statement added. In all, 6,692 applications were received from teachers from all over the country. Out of the applications received, every district selected three best teachers and forwarded these to the committee under the state secretary of education who made a short-list.

A total of 152 nominations were finally received from all states, union territories and organisations. The final selection was done by an independent jury, the statement said.

Under the revised guidelines, all regular teachers will be eligible to apply and the minimum 15 years of service had been done away with. The teachers got the chance to directly apply and nominate themselves for the award. Self-nominations from teachers were invited online.
News Source (Indian Express)