Message from Programme Director
The issue of gender has become increasingly important in
terms of teachers and teaching. The Punjab Education Department
and other agencies supporting educational development are
undertaking strategies to recruit more female teachers and
address the experiences of women teachers in schools, the
accessibility and relevance of teacher training and the
professional and career development opportunities for female
teachers.
Teacher education is a logical and vitally important place
for examining key issues such as gender that impact students.
Teachers in some, perhaps small, ways affect the attitudes
of the young as they mature into members of society. Teacher
educators, perhaps in even smaller ways, affect the attitudes
that teachers bring to their classrooms. Thus, the decision
to mainstream gender in teacher education is concerned with
creating a positive society. Mainstreaming gender contributes
to teacher education by allowing us to visualize the kinds
of lives we want to lead and the kind of society we want
to live in. To advocate the mainstreaming of gender studies
is therefore to make a commitment to a view of the world
that is to be presented to children in schools.
However, we still face challenges in mainstreaming gender
in this field. Teacher education textbooks, for example,
devote minimal space to gender issues and, in fact, at times
give the topic stereotypic and inaccurate treatment. It
can be said that Gender equity, is in the earliest stages
of consideration in teacher education. Ideally, attention
to gender issues should be infused into both pre-service
and in-service teacher education across all disciplines.
However, this is difficult to manage due to such reasons
as lack of instructor background or interest in this area,
perceived time constraints, and beliefs that these issues
no longer exist, separate attention through individual courses
or as distinct subject matter in diversity courses may be
warranted.
In order to address issues such as those stated above at
the Directorate of Staff Development (DSD), we hope to develop
an understanding of key gender issues in education in all
our trainees. To accomplish this, the material developed
by DSD is ensured to be gender sensitive and sessions on
gender and education are a part of our trainings. DSD is
also mainstreaming gender in our institutional processes
and operations. For the same reasons, we are currently conducting
a Gender Audit with support from our partner the Canada
Pakistan Basic Education Project. An action plan will be
developed on the basis of the findings and recommendations
from the audit.
I take this opportunity to reiterate DSD’s commitment to
gender equity and equality. We believe our commitments are
clear; we hope our arguments are persuasive.
Mr. Muhammed Aslam Kamboh
Programme Director
Directorate of Staff Development
Resources
• Resource Material (Download
Table of Contents)
• Female Education: Need and Benefit
Primary education is critical as it is the basic building
block – it is the first step in a longer process, without
which no further progress is possible. Primary education
has both high individual returns as well as high social
returns. This set of articles emphasizes the need for educating
females, and the positive effects of female literacy on
the overall development of a nation.
(Download
Articles)
• Access to and Quality of Education: Scope and
Impact
Primary education delivery has two aspects: quality of the
education imparted, and access to this quality education.
This set of articles focus on the scope of expanding school
facilities and improving the quality of education imparted,
and the impact such initiatives can have.
(Download
Articles)
• Administration & Management of Quality Education
The articles in this set discuss strategies to deliver quality
education and interventions to keep girls in school. The
articles cover projects and programs that have been carried
out in different places across the developing world, the
experiences of and lessons from these interventions.
(Download
Articles)
• Constraints to Education: Family, State, and
Politics
This set of articles discusses the various factors that
hinder the attainment of female education across developing
countries.
(Download
Articles)
• Successful Strategies in the Provision of Education
This set considers some success stories where female literacy
and enrollment rates have increased significantly and a
clear change in trends is visible.
(Download
Articles)
• Posters
o
Gender Sensitive Material Development
o
Gender Sensitive Teaching & Learning
o
Gender Sensitive Allocation of Resources
o
Gender Sensitive Planning in Education
Checklists and Toolkits
• Handbook- Orientation to Gender
(G1)
• Handbook- Orientation to Gender (G2)
• Gender
Integration Review Lists (GIRLs)
•
Checklist For Preparing Gender Sensitive Material
Useful Links
www.ungesi.org
www.unrisd.org
www.unicef.org/girlseducation/
www.af.org.pk/mainpage.htm
www.shirkatgah.org/
Illustrations
(Download Here (zip file))
