The Hindu Business Line : Microsoft unveils award for innovative teaching

MICROSOFT Corporation India on Wednesday announced an `Innovative Teachers Leadership' award. The award, instituted under its flagship India education programme, `Project Shiksha-Empowering the Future', seeks to honour 10 exceptional teachers who have made an outstanding contribution towards the innovative use of technology in classroom training.

The winners will be entitled to attend a three-day seminar in Singapore, which will provide them an opportunity to showcase their best practices as well as get insights into innovative practices adopted by their contemporaries across the region.

Teachers who have successfully completed training under Project Shiksha in Uttaranchal and Andhra Pradesh and under the Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti (NVS) are eligible to contend for the award.

Mr Rajiv Kaul, Managing Director, Microsoft Corporation India, said: "By instituting this award, we seek to acknowledge and encourage the innovative use of IT by teachers in the day-to-day education process."

The project was launched by Mr Bill Gates, Chairman and Chief Software Architect, Microsoft, during his Indian visit in November 2002.

With an investment of $20 million, Project Shiksha seeks to deliver affordable software solutions, comprehensive training and curriculum to over 80,000 schoolteachers and 3.5 million students across schools over the next five years.

It has so far trained 4,000 teachers and reached out to over 200,000 students.

Microsoft has signed MoUs with Uttaranchal and Andhra Pradesh, and recently with MCD Schools - under which teachers from 1,000 MCD schools in New Delhi will be provided IT skills training.

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