Investigating the Challenges Faced by the Teacher Educators after Implementation of Pre-Service B.Ed (Hons.) Elementary Four-Year Program in Sindh

Abstract

The main purpose of this article is to bring up the challenges faced by the teacher educators during the implementation of B.Ed (Hons.) elementary program initiated by the provincial governments and HEC in collaboration with United State Agency for International development (USAID) in Pakistan. In this study two general universities i.e., University of Sindh and Karachi University were included which received the funding from USAID for upliftment of Elementary Education in the Sindh province, where this teacher educators’ program was piloted and later on fully implemented. In-depth semi-structured face to face interview schedule was developed to conduct the survey type qualitative research design. Five teacher educators from each university (N=10) through purposive sampling were selected and interviewed to collect the data. The gathered data were thematically analyzed on the pattern of Braun & Clarke (2006) approach. On the bases of the analyses, it was inferred that the program despite of its successful completion of first round faced many intrinsic problems such as the lack of trained human resources, lack of involvement of the concerned faculty in curriculum decisions, lack of implementation of the modern pedagogies for bringing quality into the program. Moreover, the external factors such as physical resources and the quality of the intake were also slanting the performance of the program to some extent. These finding are in alignment with the previous studies conducted in the similar context to assess the implementation of teacher education programs. However, the administration of the institutes of so far found playing active role in carrying on the program smoothly despite of the challenges. In the light of the findings of the study, it is recommended that the intervention to provide the funds as well as physical facilities at this stage is inevitable.

Keywords: B.Ed elementary teacher educator program, implementing program, challenges