Teacher Without Borders and FarsiTeacheNet –A successful experience

TWB and FTN-previously Iranian Teachers’ Network (ITN) submitted a partnership proposal to Cisco Systems Philanthropy in July and got the grant in August 2005.

Based on this partnership they could create an opportunity to build a new online community of practice for Farsi Speaking Teachers. With financial and resource support from Cisco Philanthropy, the FTN may connect teachers with global “best practices” in pedagogy and subject-matter, along with information technology training. The structure and function of the partnership and this project allows the FTN to grow and sustain itself through the marketing and distribution of its intellectual property, consistent with their aspirations as an organization and their business plan.

Teachers Without Borders has already committed to providing their Certificate of Teaching Mastery and e-learning platform to the FTN, along with expertise on train-the-trainer models, community education, and youth involvement. FTN, though in its infancy, shows promise in terms of its organizational design, intention, feasibility, and corps of motivated teachers.

The project has been designed for scalability in proportion to resources that would make it possible for the technology, supervision, and outcomes to be anticipated, monitored, and evaluated reasonably and thoroughly.

The spirit of this enterprise is tremendous. FTN has the will and energy to help Farsi Speaking teachers become professional, self-motivated, and efficient. TWB is excited at the opportunity of assisting this new organization, and seeks to do so, in the most generous fashion possible, beginning with free access to our flagship program, The Certificate of Teaching Mastery.