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IMPROVEMENT OF THE SYSTEM OF TRAINING AND ADVANCED TRAINING AS A CONDITION FOR DEVELOPMENT OF PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION
Kh. F. Rashidov
An essential condition for reforming the national training system, including the implementation of innovative models at modern educational institutions, is the training and qualification improvement of managing and academic staff, as well as a renewed focus of the system on the challenges of professional education. The current system of training and retraining of personnel is being actively reformed and has sufficient material and human resources.
Training and qualification improvement of academic staff of lyceums and professional colleges is arranged via qualification improvement centers and faculties operating at 45 higher educational institutions, as well as through the Institute for Qualification Improvement and Retraining for Teachers of Secondary and Professional Education. During the period from 1998 to 2011 more than 1,485,000 teachers were trained and retrained. In 2011, 43,662 of academic staff have been trained, and 633 students graduated from teacher training courses. Special courses were organized in order to develop skills in IT, communication technologies, and the Internet. More than 105,000 teachers of academic lyceums and professional colleges were trained at these special courses.
Upon analysis of the current situation in the training of managers, engineers and teachers in vocational education we have discovered the following issues: (a) the reproductive nature of the content of training programs and the dogmatic form of the content structure; (b) a lack of flexibility in the choice of content and a lack of opportunities to form individual training programs; (c) a lack of use of modern communication, IT, and network skills; (d) obsolete educational technology, and (e) the absence of a body to carry out the development and monitor the implementation of a unified methodical basis for retraining and qualification improvement for special secondary and professional educational institutions. It is obvious that without addressing these issues it is impossible to bridge the gap between the demands of innovative teaching practices to the level of qualification and the actual results of training.
The conceptual model that serves as the foundation of the innovative educational program of qualification improvement of teachers is aimed at the development of such values as individuality of each participant in the educational process, meaningful human interaction with the culture through the development of basic methods of activity (research, design and management), and selfdetermination in the open education environment. The implementation of a model of an open educational environment within the training system will allow us to establish the process of training as an educational procedure and create the system of training for working with new types of professional educational institutions. The educational training program should: (a) be based on the purposes recognized by all stakeholders of the qualification improvement process and form their new educational needs; (b) ensure participation in various organizational
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forms of individual and collective cooperation in research and projects; (c) include into the educational content the issues relevant on global, national, and regional levels; and (d) provide the solution of the pedagogical tasks which have the vital status for all participants of the educational process. The educational program consists of three specialized programs: pedagogical counseling (tutoring), pedagogical project development and pedagogical research. The presence in the educational program of specialized programs was predetermined by the following provisions: first, the innovative nature of the managers, engineers and teachers requires the development of major types of intellectual activity (research, project development and management); and secondly, individualization of the educational process can be carried out by a teacher of a new type, a tutor who conducts pedagogical counseling, supports and maintains the process of differentiation while teaching.
In order to develop an efficient system of retraining and qualification improvement for management and academic staff of professional colleges and academic lyceums we have to improve the teacher training and qualification improvement system. A number of organizational measures should be carried out: (a) improvement of the image and status of the teacher’s profession through introduction of efficient mechanisms for motivating professional growth and selfeducation of teachers; (b) creation of conditions for professional adaptation of young teachers in the educational process through mentoring and other forms of psychological and social work; (c) refinement of educational programs to improve the skills of teachers, taking into account the rating of a teacher and individual training needs, training based at educational institutions which are implementing innovative programs; and (d) creation of conditions for the advanced training, retraining and professional development of teachers and other measures aimed at implementing the above goals.
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