Engaging with Tomorrow’s Teachers at Bombay Teachers Training College (BTTC)

On 25th April 2025, I enjoyed the opportunity to speak to student teachers at the Bombay Teachers Training College at the behest of its progressive Principal Dr. Bhagwan Balani. The training college is the seed because they are the hope, the change, the catalysts who can move by example.

If we can shift focus of that curriculum to include our goals for children of personal autonomy, social responsibility, critical thinking and adaptability to an uncertain future we can win this battle.

The “how” of it should be the teacher education.

They informed me that they were introducing values in education which is commendable. So, I asked them if anyone was catering to the fear of failure in 12th graders to cater to mental health to the sicio emotional stage of the child? No. How can we do it in a literature, science or math class? We can’t walk in and say let’s do values. Can we teach resilience by preaching? Can we do research on this, reflect and collate ideas to lighten the burden of those after us? Instead of merely presenting research for the sake of content creation? Can we problem solve as well?

Can we decide on saliency in subjects given our mercurial tech tools? Can students share and collaborate to complete the textbook in a few months and practice with unseen applications for expertise and autonomy? Can we stop explaining and trust their intelligence? Can we let them fail that we taught as a valuable step to growth? Can we walk the talk?

Can the college equip students with new pedagogy of flipped classrooms, peer correction, respected choices, collaborative explorations and innovation with critical questioning by the teachers and peers?

Can we get AI to generate mindmaps that will show features and impact of leaders to compare Aurangzeb to Modi? Or use a single geo landscape to study its difference in various Earth zones? Or ponder on how to introduce ethics in maths? Or how to connect and integrate various disciplines with PE or art? Is it possible to break away from a syllabus that is already available online?

The gaps on the road exist where each segment in foundation, primary, middle, high, college, professional study and jobs are disconnected. Stakeholder agendas vary. Team skills, negotiation language, the register of business communication, note making, discussion skills, consensus building required in the workplace are all alien after two decades or more in education. Apprenticeship rare. Social projects not mandated, so inequity is not an experienced issue. Can we change that?

Can we have a gap review committee? A quality control peer review of textbooks, resources? Can we hear student voices advocating their own grievances? The training college can make these happen.

When student teachers do this in classrooms, their students will advertise the very claims that cram prospectus promises in schools. The word and deed will meet to infect others. Change is a wave that starts with a ripple. Be that ripple.