St Xavier’s College will introduce a four-year integrated BEd course that students can take up right after clearing the Class XII board examinations.

Students are at present required to complete graduation before applying for BEd.

“The new integrated teacher training programme to be introduced in 2020 will be offered in two streams — arts and science,” Father Dominic Savio, the principal of St Xavier’s College, said.

The programme in arts will be called BA BEd and the one in science BSc BEd.

The National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE), the national body that regulates teacher education programmes in the country, had announced the launch of the four-year integrated teacher training course last year.

Several institutions in the country have introduced the new curriculum in the current 2019-20 session. St Xavier’s College is likely to be the first institution in Bengal to offer it, a teacher of the Park Street college said.

“When the NCTE announced its decision to introduce the four-year integrated BEd last year, we decided to run the programme at our institution as it would save aspiring teachers one year against the existing system of first doing graduation over three years and then enrolling for a two-year BEd course,” the principal said.

Teachers of secondary or Higher Secondary schools are required to study a general degree course of three years’ duration in science, arts or commerce and have a two-year BEd degree.

St Xavier’s, which has been offering a BEd course for

nearly five decades, had been noticing that many of the BEd students had made up their mind about taking up teaching as a career right after Class XII.

“We felt it was necessary to start the four-year integrated course for this group of students who are focussed on taking up teaching as a career,” Father Savio said. The curriculum of the new course will be in compliance with the NCTE norms, he said.

The college will, however, continue to offer the two-year BEd programme alongside the new four-year course.

The number of seats to be offered in each of the BA BEd and BSc BEd courses will be decided later, Savio said.

MEd and doctoral programmes in education are also on the cards at St Xavier’s.

Counselling

Jadavpur University announced the counselling schedule for admission to its five-year evening courses in civil, electrical and mechanical engineering. Candidates have been called for provisional admission on September 9. Details are on www.jaduniv.edu.in.

Distance learning

Part-time and contractual teachers teaching in the Higher Secondary sections of state-aided Higher Secondary schools will be able to pursue BEd or equivalent teacher training programmes through distance learning, according to a notice issued by the school education department.