Curriculum expert: Communication Skills for Polytechnics

About the project

Improving Teaching and Learning of English Communication Skills in West Bengal Polytechnics is a two-year project in partnership project with the Department of Technical Education, Training and Skill Development, West Bengal, India. The project aims to reach 76 polytechnics from across the state, approximately 76 principals and teachers of English and approximately 12977 students.

This project has three key objectives:

1. develop the English proficiency and pedagogical skills of teachers of English to teach English for Employability courses 
2. improve students’ English proficiency for employability opportunities
3. build capacity of principals of polytechnic institutions to support teacher development and upskilling interventions.

This call is to invite applications to meet objective #2 specifically.

About the role

Students in polytechnics institutions undergo up to approximately 56 hours of Lectures and Practical each of Communication Skills in English in Year 1. The curriculum has recently undergone a review and the new version aims to develop students’ communication skills (reading, writing, speaking and listening), confidence in using English and personality development.

The department wishes to undertake a curriculum review that would help them improve the curriculum’s relevance to students’ present and the future to better prepare them for employment opportunities. This curriculum review will be conducted for Year 1 of the Diploma programme since only Year 1 curriculum covers eight credits of this course.

This review aims to identify the right resources for inclusion in the syllabus and validate approaches in teacher training and teaching communicative English that will be adopted in the programme. This review will inform the student learning and teacher training materials used on this programme. It does not aim to change the existing curriculum, it only aims to make recommendations for the department to consider.

A syllabus committee involving relevant stakeholders representing the department will collaborate with the consultant for this review. Such collaboration will include consulting (remotely and or in person) the committee for necessary information, understanding on the ground challenges and validating recommendations for their practicality and applicability.

Scope of work

Part 1: Curriculum review

• review existing curriculum i.e. any rationale/ approach/process documents and textbooks.
• consult key stakeholders such as trainers, students, course writers and review the curriculum in the light of these discussions.
• consult the syllabus committee 
• map curriculum to international standards and best practices
• present a first draft of review and recommendations to the syllabus committee for feedback
• submit a final report outlining key features of the review and concrete, actionable recommendations.

Part 2: Implications on teacher training and student course

Based on the existing curriculum and recommendations from this review:

• ascertaining what skills and knowledge teachers need
• identifying approach and content for teachers’ capacity building 
• ascertaining the validity and suitability of existing British Council content
• identifying areas in which students need to be assessed to achieve the learning outcomes of the curriculum and ways of assessing these.

The consultancy will include approximately seven desk days and five days for in-country visit. This includes consulting stakeholders and preparing the report content and collaborating remotely with the project team.

Expected output

A final report outlining the key features and considerations of review and recommendations that are concrete and actionable

Qualifications and experience required

Essential

• post-graduate qualification in ELT/Education or any other relevant subjects
• experience of developing a curriculum for communicative English, Life Skills development and employability skills for the Skills sector. 
• experience of skills sector
• experience and knowledge of teacher training and teacher development projects
• experience of conducting curriculum or similar reviewing exercises and writing reports
• experience of working with remote teams and meeting tight deadlines

Desirable

Knowledge and experience of the skills sector in India (or similar context)

Applicants should include:

• a covering letter tailored to the above requirements
• a CV tailored to the above requirements
• a proposal indicating the approach to meet the objectives of this assignment along with a proposed costing and outline of number of days required for each deliverable. (maximum 2000 words)

Please send the above to Radhika.Gholkar@britishcouncil.org with the title “West Bengal Curriculum review” by 10 March 2020

Please note we will respond to successful applicants within ten working days of the application submission.