The Alberta Teachers’ Association

Jacques Bérubé, board treasurer for the Canadian Organization for Development through Education (CODE), and Hila Olyan, the organization’s director of international programs, join Association president Mark Ramsankar during a recent funding announcement aimed at transforming teacher education in Mozambique.

An $18 million funding commitment announced at the Alberta Teachers’ Association’s Calgary City Teachers’ Convention will help transform teacher education in Mozambique.

Association president Mark Ramsankar announced that Global Affairs Canada, an agency of the federal government, has signed a commitment with the Canadian Organization for Development through Education (CODE) to deliver a seven-year program intended to improve the quality of education for girls and boys in Mozambique. The program will focus on improving the quality of teacher education at four of the country’s teacher training institutes.

While the ATA is not directly involved in the newly announced program, CODE invited the Association to formally announce the new initiative to recognize the organizations’ longstanding partnership and acknowledge the financial support and expertise the ATA has provided over the past 30 years.

“As Canadian teachers, as Alberta teachers, we feel the need to give back,” said ATA president Mark Ramsankar. “For 30 years, the Alberta Teachers’ Association has been supporting the important work of the Canadian Organization for Development through Education within the Association’s International Co-operation Program. Our partnership with, and support of, CODE further speaks to how Alberta teachers view the importance of the work.”

To implement the seven-year program, CODE is partnering with the award-winning literacy organization Associação Progresso and Mozambique’s Ministry of Education and Human Development.

Strengthening education at teacher training institutes is expected to immediately benefit the roughly 100 primary schools — which represent approximately 50,000 students — where student-teachers complete their practicums. It’s hoped that the pilot project will benefit even more students once teachers enter the workforce and the ministry uses the lessons learned to improve teacher education in the rest of the country.

Around 1,200 student-teachers are currently enrolled in the four participating institutes. ❚