Teacher Preparation Programme (TPP) celebrates first graduation ceremony at AKA Hyderabad

Five women graduated from the Aga Khan Academies’ TPP during an evening ceremony on Tuesday 12^th March 2019. The TPP, a multi-phase programme, is designed to prepare highly promising, locally trained teachers with the knowledge and skills to effectively deliver the International Baccalaureate curriculum.

The aim of the TPP is to train teachers to become transformative educators in their communities with the vision, as the programme guide states, “to provide exceptionally talented and highly motivated Academies students with a rigorous academic and leadership-development experience.” The skills the trainees gain from completing any component of the programme are considered highly valuable in any teaching setting, thus creating the potential to raise academic standards in the variety of schools in which they might teach.

Ekta Lalani, Manali Laskar, Afeera Maryam, Nivedita Paul and Himani Sood were the pioneering graduates of the 18-month long Teacher Preparation Programme (TPP) mentored internship at the Aga Khan Academy Hyderabad. By creating leading teachers with strong pedagogical skills, the TPP also aspires to impact the broader regional education landscape by preparing teachers to work effectively and enhance practice not just in IB schools but also as government educators.

Koel Ray, Academic Development Manager at the Academy, has been supervising the TPP. She presided over the ceremony, which was attended by the graduates’ families, their mentors, and senior leadership of the Academies Unit and AKA Hyderabad. Jonathan Marsh, who has system-wide responsibility of teacher development and Tom Abuto, TPP curriculum coordinator, were both present and made short congratulatory speeches. Certificates were handed out by Dr. Geoffrey Fisher, Head of Academy and Graham Ranger, Academic Director for the network. 

Salim Bhatia, Director of Academies, also addressed the gathering. “Today’s ceremony is a milestone in the Academies’ journey to realise its mission,” he noted, and continued to elaborate on how the programme promoted collaboration and helped aimed to develop a strengthened network of teachers in a single learning community that will eventually be spread across 14 countries. “Academy teachers have been appointed as mentors, and this provides rich opportunities for current experienced teachers to deepen their knowledge, improve their mastery and enhance their own career progressions.” He commended the graduates for the grit, determination and enthusiasm they had demonstrated over the course of the last 18 months.

Graduate Afeera Maryam delivered the key note address, and spoke of the way the programme had impacted her classroom teaching. The problem-based-learning modules encouraged the graduates to collectively brainstorm and experiment with solutions in real-time. “It is not an exaggeration when I say that this programme made me who I am today or what I want to be,” she said. “It was the culture of the Academy, the humility of the people around me and the brilliant students with whom I interacted with on a daily basis. It was the constant reflection that challenged me to deconstruct and learn.”