Promoting excellence in teaching, both on campus and more widely, is a fundamental goal of the Aga Khan Academies.
The Academies aim to identify and develop teachers of the highest quality who are committed to both the all-round development of young people and their own professional excellence. Of the almost 400 employees across the Academies, most are local to their countries. Each Academy supports excellence by modelling best practices in teaching and learning within its classes and by providing high quality development opportunities for all Academy teachers. Faculty members are also enriched by opportunities to work collaboratively with experienced colleagues from around the globe and to teach abroad within the Aga Khan Academies network.
AKDN / Lucas Cuervo Moura
Each Academy hosts a Professional Development Centre (PDC) for the benefit of the Academy, government schools in the country and external educators in the region. The PDCs consult with teachers, school leaders and government education bodies to develop programmes in line with each country’s needs. They aim to strengthen the profession of teaching by providing substantial professional learning opportunities to teachers and school administrators from local government and other not-for-profit schools.
PDC programmes build competence by focusing equally on enhancing teachers’ subject knowledge and on how best to teach that subject, including interactive learning techniques and student-centred teaching methods, as well as leadership development and the innovative Teacher Preparation Programme that develops young local graduates as IB educators to teach in the Academy and the Aga Khan Schools network. The programmes provide participants with a balance of intensive learning activities, followed by an extended period of application and observation within the context of their own classrooms.
As centres of excellence that implement best practices in education and teaching, the Aga Khan Academies, their teachers and the PDCs are valuable resources for education systems in the countries and regions where they are located.