LAHORE: Launched in 2013 to overcome the shortage of good English language teaching resources, the Punjab Education English Language Initiative (PEELI) has trained at least 123,000 teachers in five years, Daily Times has learnt. Talking to Daily Times, Schools Education Department (SED) secretary Dr Allah Buksh Malik said PEELI initiative was launched under the Quaid-e-Azam Academy for Educational Development (OAED) programme to ensure that all students were provided with quality education and were equipped with necessary skills and competencies for participation in an ever-changing globalised society. He explained that PEELI was a professional development initiative for teachers, teacher trainers and head teachers. He said the aim of the initiative was to provide one round of training to all primary and elementary school teachers by 2019. “PEELI uses a holistic and experiential approach towards teacher education by providing professional development opportunities for these groups, such as formal training (face-to-face), materials development training, conferences and seminars, access to high quality digital and offline resources and other forms of Continuing Professional Development (CPD). Its ultimate objective is to contribute to stronger student learning outcomes.” Further, the SED secretary said that major components of PEELI included professional development of trainers, primary school teachers, and head teachers by lead trainers of the British Council, along with the development of teaching standards, training materials and resources for teachers and trainers. “It also plans to build the professional capacity of QAED experts to develop learning material by using the services of professional experts from UK.” On a question regarding the number of teachers and students in Punjab schools, Malik said that of the 12 million students in 53,000 public school of the province, at least seven million were in primary- and middle- school. He said the department employed at least 400,000 teachers, of whom at least 300,000 were working at primary and elementary schools. “The department had launched the Punjab Schools Reform Road map in 2010 to ensure access, quality and equity in schooling. Meanwhile, Additional Director General Syed Mubashar Hussain explained that in November 2017, the British Council commissioned an independent company FAME Education Consultants to conduct independent assessment to measure progress of the project against the key outputs, the competence of expert trainers, and the attitudes of trainee primary teachers. He said the company used a range of primary and secondary data sources including observations, focus group discussions, trainee questionnaires and QAED’s database. He said there was still a long way to go for improving teaching quality at schools. While the surveys and assessment studies conducted from time to time [by the department as well as by third parties] show that the teaching and learning quality is far from ideal, he said small improvements were being achieved every year. QAED deputy director planning Nadeem Asghar observed that the independent evaluation had concluded that the training was executed at all the training centres as per schedule. “The training achieved its numerical targets to a large extent as 90 percent of expected number of primary school teachers, 99 percent of expert trainers’ availability at the training centres, and availability of training materials to all participants,” he said, adding that QAED had clearly demonstrated that PEELI training was responsive to the needs of primary school teachers, helping prepare them for classrooms and helping the development of personal reflection, adaptability and improving their classroom pedagogic practice. PEELI was launched in collaboration with the British Council. Published in Daily Times, April 3rd 2018.