International Journal of Research & Review (www.ijrrjournal.com) 147 Vol.6; Issue: 4; April 2019 International Journal of Research and Review www.ijrrjournal.com E-ISSN: 2349-9788; P-ISSN: 2454-2237 Review Article Strengthening Cluster Resource Centre (CRC) As a Forum for Continuous Teacher Development: My Experience in Mayurbhanj District, Odisha, India Lokesh Prasad Dash District Programme Officer, Girls’ Education Programme, CARE India, Odisha, India ABSTRACT To bring about qualitative improvement in education, Cluster Resource Centres (CRCs) were established in each block of every district under Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan to conduct in-service teacher training and to provide academic support to teachers and schools on a regular basis as well as to help in community mobilization activities. According to the previous researches, it was found that the functioning of these centres were far away from the reality due to lack of physical resources and overloaded administrative responsibilities of the Cluster Resource Centre Coordinators (CRCCs). The situation of these Cluster Resource Centres in Odisha and especially in Mayurbhanj district was also not encouraging. There was hardly any scope for Monthly Sharing Meetings (MSMs) at the clusters. The deteriorating situation of these Cluster Resource Centres and absence of scope for continuous capacity building of teachers prompted CARE India (an International Development Organisation) to intervene in the district. It tested an innovation to revive the Cluster Resource Centres and to convert them in to a continuous teacher development forum. This in turn enhanced the reading skill of the children in the intervened schools. The results mentioned here are clearly reflected in the end-line assessment report conducted by a Delhi based research agency named “KAARAK”. Keywords: Cluster Resource Centre, continuous teacher development forum. Monthly Sharing Meetings (MSMs) CARE India, Sarva Siksha Abhiyan, Mayurbhanj INTRODUCTION In the year 2014 CARE India started its intervention through START EARLY: READ IN TIME project to improve early grade reading (Grades 1-4) among the most marginalized children in selected government schools of Mayurbhanj district in Odisha. With this aim, it worked in 5 blocks, 48 clusters and 516 schools to reach out to nearly 27000 primary school children. CARE India realised that there was lack of scope for continuous capacity building of CRCCs as well as teachers. The teachers were either imparted pre-service or in- service training. The trainings could not suffice to the needs of the teachers as these were not regular or continuous in nature. For this reason, they were not well acquainted with the new curriculums and modern teaching techniques. The traditional thoughts and old techniques adopted by teachers could not be beneficial for the current classroom situations. This badly affected the language skill of children in general and the reading skill in particular. CARE India strongly believed “Teachers are important catalyst to ensure quality education, enhancement in their capacity is an important pathway for ensuring equitable quality education”. Therefore, the project strategy on early reading targeted on building teachers capabilities and also creating teacher support structures at the school, cluster and