International Teachers day was on 5th October 2021 and with it a reminder that for nearly two years the education system across the world is still facing significant challenges caused by the disruptions from the COVID-19 pandemic.

As this year’s theme was ‘Teachers at the heart of Education recovery’, we reflected on the irreplaceable value of the teaching profession in society but also on the difficult working conditions teachers were facing and what they did to mitigate them. This theme came at a crucial time for teachers in the National Teachers’ Colleges (NTCs) because they were on the frontlines of ensuring learning continuity in Uganda when schools were closed. They had to rapidly adapt to distance learning and manage new digital tools while providing socio-emotional support to their students.

The teachers in the NTCs proved beyond reasonable doubt the exceptional role they played and set an example of the great work teachers in Uganda are capable of achieving. From the first school lockdown in March 2020, NTC teachers embraced and proactively participated in the development of new education innovations to ensure the continuity of learning. They started by creating the TTE Sandbox that set the pace for the creation of many more digital innovations such as;

• The very first online General Teaching Methods (GTM) course, a professional online course that was introduced to NTC lecturers and students to improve their teaching skills.

• The Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL) Course which provides knowledge and skills to apply digital tools in order to enhance teaching and learning in educational settings. Here, the NTC lecturers played an important role in the development of this course, as they created digital content for two important tools in the course; screencasts and podcasts.

• The Academic Management System which is a digital system developed for capturing all college activities or data that is related to academic management. Some of the data includes staff and student registration, student applications, registration and admission, Human Resource Management and inventory management.

Therefore, this year at the TTE project, we celebrated the exceptional dedication and courage of all teachers in the National Teachers Colleges, as well as their capacity to adapt and innovate under very challenging and uncertain conditions. They are indeed at the heart of the education recovery efforts and are key in accelerating progress towards inclusive, equitable and quality education for all learners.

The National Teachers’ Colleges shared their experience from the lockdown and how they turned the situation around to enable the continuity of learning for their students on a Teachers’ Day talk show.