The issues that drive the conscience to write this piece article, or column in the pragmatic sense, of educational policies and curriculum in the real sense amplify the state of operations involved only by the students. Thus, learners appear central, or everything as a matter of fact, in the policies and curriculum.It can never be termed improper to dignify the learners through education policies and curriculum. Yet, it is supposed to hold onto a wide space for the teaching professionals - teachers by the common names -so that these two entities - teachers and learners - turn out complementary.
A complete form of a human being requires a balanced length of their hands and legs, and the asymmetry of hands and legs in length does not predict perfection. So, it sadly happens in the case of teacher-learneremphasis, though the educational policy and curriculum feebly address the extent of teaching professionals for the determined prospecting learners. Here, someone may argue against the stance of the teaching staff dawn intentionally. It seems they can defend that the change of curriculum or the adoption of educational policy is the brainchild of the galaxy of teachers. Thus, the change takes place by the direct influence of the teachers.
Next, teachers are made aware and competent enough of the changes and behaviors adopted by them through workshops, training, seminars, and symposiums. The aim of this article is not to deny them; rather, it aims to dig deeper truth up. For instance; every change in educational policy and curriculum requires the teachers to be oriented with teaching manuals, guidelines, and teaching strategies, which we lack. It seems the authority nourishes the conception that teachers will learn through teaching as learners learn through practice, though there remains a big gap between the approaches to teachers and the learners in our context. For example, a learner's social orientation, psychological demeanor, and destination are well-knitted in every course, which helps as a guiding principle for the teachers for their approach fixation to those courses. However, no effort is made to serve with the course-wise manuals, which tend to highlight the mental aptitude and whole-hearted preparation a teacher requires to deal with that very course and those very learners dealing with that course.
In the case of research, 'academic stress' relates only to the learners, though teachers can never be segregated in the academic journey alongside a learner. A study has recently been conducted to identify whether teachers face academic stress concludes with interesting findings, which may have considerable issues for policymakers. The findings were compiled from the aggregated data collected from 43 college-level teachers across the country. The research tended to find out the extent of academic stress on five grounds - (a) personal inadequacy, (b) emerging conflicts, (c) interpersonal difficulties, (d) teaching methods, and (e) inadequate study facilities. Every category comprised 6 questions, which aggregately culminated in a survey questionnaire of 30 questions having 172 highest scores and 0 lowest scores for every question.
The personal inadequacy comprises a few personal issues related to psychological stress oriented through interaction in the academic arena. For instance, the inappropriate course plan, insufficient time allocation for designing course plan, insufficient preparation for class, lack of concentration during the class, unfriendly relationship with the college administration, insufficient budgeting by the administration for smart class, and lack of self-esteem. Here, 73.26% of teachers agree on the case of 'insufficient budgeting from the college administration regarding smart classrooms. Consequently, the teachers face extra pressure in the active hours of class taking. The rate of stress is calculated here as 68.02%, which surely leads to low self-esteem among teachers. The ultimate result of this sort of incapacity falls on the low rate of understanding of classes attended by the students.
The interpersonal difficulty of a teacher covers (a) whether a teacher is self-assertive, (b) whether he shows socio-economic status to the learners, (c) whether he fails to get along with the ever-changing curriculum and pedagogy, (d) whether his testing method is inclusive, unbiased, thorough, predictive and exemplary, and (e) whether learners have open access to you in case of any sort of academic difficulty. In this category, the concerning issue is the lack of teachers in getting along with the ever-changing curriculum. The aggregated stress score is 116 out of 172, which implies that the training, workshops, seminars, and symposiums prior to the implementation of the new curriculum cannot address the teachers inclusively.
Again, a curriculum is surely to focus on the methods that the teachers should apply to reach the majority of the learners in the classes. However, pair and peer judgment may motivate the learners to learn through social interaction. But does the educational policy pave the way to guide how a teacher will prepare for their classes? Obviously not. Teaching is a profession, which should not be branded as a 'Guru- Sishwya' episode garnered through the ages where a teacher appears to be a hermit, who is likely to preach the dictum of god. Time has changed so has the acumen of the learners. A teacher is not now an all-knowing oracle. Hence, he needs to prepareproperly before the class, he needs to ask for cooperation from their colleagues.
The idea of micro-teaching, and professional learning community speaks for the necessity of cooperative and collaborative teaching, where a group of teachers devises the plans for the class, rehearse together how the specific part is going to be taught, and research together the outcomes and challenges the learners showing and facing. Thus, teaching professionalism has challenges if the teachers do not have semester-wise or yearly course plans if the teachers do not have any articulation regarding the methods for the courses dealing with the classes, and if the teachers are not habituated with teamwork in case of preparing course plans, course materials, teaching strategies, and disseminating information in the classes.
The lack of study facilities poses barriers to the attainment of the satisfaction of a teacher being a professional. Suppose, he/she is teaching alter-reality, upside-down of reality, or hyper-reality in the class. But he has no technological assortment in the class to let it visualize. Then, it happens that a teacher feels the gap between imagination and reality, and the learners fall into the group of parrots, learning and performing language like a machine.
Thus, the arena of teaching professionalism claims that the educational perspective ensures whether a teacher can materialize what he imagines, whether the teaching becomes a cooperative and collaborative effort on the part of the teachers, and whether the teaching manual focuses the multi-faceted challenges the teachers face physically, socially, psychologically, and administratively; and the proper way out of those challenges.
The writer is a BCS Cadre (General Education) and Editorial Member, International Journal of Recent Innovations in Academic Research
