Reconstituting the Education Branch

Reconstituting the Education Branch

            After having served four fighter squadron tenures, three ship tenures & a few years at the operational nerve centre of Naval Aviation in its ultimate madhouse called ‘Chetak Section’, I was put out to pasture at the Naval Institute of Aeronautical Technology. Please don’t get me wrong….I have the highest regard for those who were responsible in their time for training me and those who simply revel at the task of guiding “lost” souls in our various military training institutes & schools. But for some like me, high on AVCAT or simply the rush of “operations”, it seemed as if the throttles had suddenly been pulled back to neutral.

    

          Let’s face it…training or instructing others is not everyone’s cup of favourite beverage. A little dive into its depths tells me that Training “…is the imparting of knowledge, skills, and competencies as a result of the teaching of vocational or practical skills and knowledge that relates to specific useful competencies. It has specific goals of improving one's capability, capacity, and performance. It thus forms the core of apprenticeships and provides the backbone of content at institutes of technology.” Whew….that’s a mouthful!

            NIAT’s instructional staff comprised of air technical officers & sailors with one sole officer from the Education branch. This officer, & I saw at least three or four of them occupy that billet during my time there, was usually not an aeronautical engineer and therefore helped only in filling out a vacant slot when it came to covering a basic subject like Radar/ communication theory, etc. The officer’s other role, which only he/ she was “trained” in, was to try & determine shortfalls in training through certain algorithms which primarily utilised data from academic performance and trainee feedbacks. Needless to say, while those reports from the Education Officer would have pleased a civil educational institute, they did little to help enhance the quality of training being imparted at a military training institute. I suspect the officers of Executive Branch at other training schools at Kochi also shared a similar view.     

            To reiterate, Military education and training is a process which intends to establish and improve the capabilities of military personnel in their respective roles. These roles are frequently required to be assayed in difficult conditions and I am not just referring to the weather here. While there is no denying the need to profit from the advances in technology, the over-emphasis on classroom instructions/ lesson plans etc. tends to place military training in a strait jacket. Nevertheless, to make us instructors in our respective training areas more proficient (and indeed to qualify for the meagre “instructor allowance”) in our job, we had to mandatorily undergo a two week course at the Naval Institute of Educational and Training Technology (NIETT). I too underwent the course along with a group of officers from Shivaji, Valsura, Agrani, Naval Academy, etc. End of course discussions indicated that we had neither gained much nor were we impressed/ convinced by what the staff at NIETT tried so hard to convey.   

            This got me wondering about the Education branch itself & the increasingly large role it had begun to exercise in the field of professional military training in the Indian Navy. So, I did a little bit of my own research to determine its origins, evolution & relevance in the present day scenario. In this endeavour, I was largely helped by the Indian Navy’s own official websites. So, here goes…

            The Education branch was primarily constituted to organise and impart training to sailors of the “Boy entry” era whose educational standard was well short of what the Navy required at that period of time in our history. As time progressed, the Branch evolved from the Schoolmaster Cadre in 1928 to its present avatar.

            In 1944, an Instructor Branch was created to broaden the base of educational training and training methodology. The intake into the ranks of Instructor Lieutenant Commander (RINVR)/ Instructor Lieutenant (RINVR) was from candidates between thirty and forty years of age, who had an Honours degree in Mathematics/ Physics or Mechanical/ Electrical Engineering and who had experience of imparting training in a recognised university. This new Instructor Branch was added on to the existing Schoolmaster Cadre. If I am not wrong, at this point in time, the technical/ professional training institutes at Valsura, Shivaji, NIAT, SFNA etc. were either non-existent or at a very nascent stage and hence the need for a separate “Instructor Branch”.

            In 1948, the Schoolmaster Branch/ Cadre was first merged into a new Education Branch and a little later, the Education Branch was renamed as the Instructor Branch. The intake into the Instructor Branch was at two levels. Direct Entry Instructor Sub Lieutenants were required to have an Honours degree in Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry. Warrant Instructor Officers were required to be graduates in these subjects.

            In 1951, with the formation of the Naval Air Arm's Fleet Requirement Unit, Education Officers were made responsible for providing meteorological services. Further re-organisations took place commencing 1955 and culminated in re-designation of the Instructor Branch as the Education Branch in 1971. The year 1974 saw one of the last major re-organisations leading to the following major changes-

            (a)         To cope with the increasing level of technology of weapons, sensors and equipment entering service, the minimum educational qualification of Education Officers on entry was raised to a Masters degree in Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry or English with Physics up to graduate level and degree in Electrical/ Mechanical Engineering.

            (b)       To ensure better understanding and for more effective utilisation, the initial training of Education Officers was increased from 16 to 36 weeks to include Naval Orientation, Navigation and Naval Scientific Orientation courses.

         (c)       Oceanographic Forecasting was included in the responsibilities of the Education Branch.

                        Education officers used to be trained in "training technology" during their initial training. Later, it was considered necessary that all instructors in training establishments should be acquainted with "training methods". Accordingly, in 1971, a Naval Institute of Education was set up at Cochin. In 1974, the scope of the Institute was expanded to include "Training Technology" and it was renamed as the Naval Institute of Educational and Training Technology (NIETT). The Institute conducts in-service training for officers and sailors in Teaching Methods and Training Technology.

            In 1988, the qualifications for entry into the Education Branch were further broadened to include a post graduate degree in Computers/ graduate degree in Computer Engineering. And in 1991, it was decided that women officers could join the Navy in the Education Branch and the Logistic and Law cadres. Accordingly, the first batch of nine women Education officers joined the Branch in July 1992 on a seven-year short service commission, extendable to ten years.

            Bear in mind that none of the professional training schools, institutes or academies are staffed exclusively by officers of the Education Branch despite the apparent explanation that a modern Navy needed an “Education Branch” staffed with officers with such educational qualifications to help bring it up to speed in a technologically fast-changing world. In fact, almost all of the professional training in the Navy is conducted by officers/ men of different branches at their respective schools, institutes. The Education Branch has thus become the virtual provider of auditors to scrutinise/ examine the way the other branches conduct training without itself having any field experience of that particular Branch!    

            Somewhere along the way, responsibilities to organise and conduct various exams [recruitment tests, educational tests (NEA/ CW/ HET/ ET1, etc.), Command/ Professional Management and Staff College Entrance (C/PM & SCE) Examinations for officers, etc.] was also entrusted to this branch. Now, if you ask me, all of these tasks can be carried out equally well by officers from the Executive/ Technical branches too & do not require specially trained educationists and a whole separate branch/ cadre of officers for the purpose. My guess is that the Education Branch was given this task by the Navy to justify its existence to the Ministry of Defence once the “Boy entry” era ended.

            With the general rise in educational standards at entry level for officers and sailors alike, the basic function of the Education Branch has become diluted. The need of the hour for the Navy is to train its personnel rather than to educate them. Consequently, the direct recruitment of officers to the Education Branch may not be the way to go any longer especially when equally qualified and better equipped [in terms of core expertise] officers are present in the mainstream Navy [surface, sub-surface and air].

            In such a scenario, I would propose reconstitution of the Education Branch & staffing it with officers seconded/ selected from the mainstream executive/ technical branches of the Navy based upon their aptitude for training/ instructional duties. These officers would then man all billets [from Director/ OiC to faculty staff] in training institutes and schools. This is an extension of the existing concept generally followed for selection of officers to man training billets in the Submarine Arm, Naval Aviation, Marine Commandos, Provost, etc.

            The existing Education Branch officers qualified in meteorological sciences could be part of a “Meteorological Branch”. The remaining officers could be required to undergo a professional course (Communication, ASW, Navigation & Direction, Gunnery, Aviation Technical, MESC, Electrical specialisation, etc.) and absorbed in the respective branches. This should be doable since the Education Branch officers already have either a Master’s degree in basic science subjects or a Bachelor’s degree in engineering (Mechanical, Electrical, Instrumentation, Computer Science, etc.) at entry level.

            Award of BTech degree to all graduates of INA would also complement this insofar as intake for the Education Branch in the longer term is concerned. The reconstituted Education Branch, now staffed with officers seconded/ selected from the mainstream executive/ technical branches, would itself receive a massive boost in terms of command of different schools/ institutes. It would also ensure its complete integration with Naval “training” rather than “teaching”.

            A useful fallout would be absorption & effective utilisation of personnel from mainstream executive/ technical branches better suited for educational/ training duties in the Education Branch, rather than pulling out personnel more suited for “operational” billets and consigning them to “training” billets from time to time as an ad hoc measure. Somewhat like trying to fit square pegs in round holes.

            Maybe it is time to retire the Education Branch and bring back the Instructor Branch in a new avatar….