Nargiza Kuchkarova
Nargiza Kuchkarova is involved in teacher recruitment and professional development for some of the best schools in Uzbekistan. “I am from a small town and the British Council helped me develop as a professional,” she says.
Nargiza first became involved with the British Council in 2007 while she was working as an English teacher in the small town of Kattakurgan, in the Samarkand region. While on a trip to Tashkent, she visited the council’s office to obtain visual aids for her class and learn about professional development opportunities for teachers.
Eventually, she completed the ETTE teacher-training programme and was invited to participate in the pilot training for PRESETT, a project to reform the university curriculum and introduce a modern methodology for training English teachers.
“The training allows you to see how you could teach differently,” she says. “Using more engaging teaching methods, like entertaining tasks and games, students enjoy the lessons and are encouraged to use their imaginations and dream big. As a teacher, you start to see life through their eyes. I’m proud to have offered my students a passion for language and culture, and a desire to see the world. Many of those children have grown up to become professionals – English teachers, marketers and IT people. Some have gone to Silicon Valley to work for big companies like Google and Apple, which is a huge achievement for children from a small, regional town in Uzbekistan.”
Today, Nargiza Kuchkarova continues to expand horizons for both students and other teachers. She says being fluent in English has given her many opportunities, including internships abroad, studying in the USA with the Teacher Excellence Award programme, and studying in a master's programme in the UK thanks to the Hornby Foundation Scholarship.
“Twenty years ago, I would never have imagined that, at the age of 38, I would receive a grant and study for a master's degree in the UK,” says Kuchkarova. “For teachers like me, from remote areas, learning English and the work of the British Council have opened up new horizons. Sometimes I think about teachers of other subjects who do not have such opportunities. I wish I could give them the wonderful experience I gained through British Council projects. It’s helped me think about how I can create fundamental positive change.”
This year, Nargiza’s team at the Agency of Presidential Educational Institutions created a professional development platform with modules in Uzbek and English which teachers of any subject can use. The platform encourages the use of modern, student-focused teaching methods for all subjects, which are based on the principles of active learning and learning through research.
Nargiza says that today’s students shouldn’t just passively absorb information from a teacher, they should also learn to extract that information through research, and then filter and analyse it, as well as express their own opinions, solve problems and make decisions. “These are 21st-century competencies and it is the job of schools and teachers to equip students with these skills and help them succeed in a rapidly changing job market,” she emphasises.
Nargiza Kuchkarova also taught English to officers of Uzbekistan’s Ministry of Defense, who then completed international internships and participated in several British Council projects, such as English for Tourism, Learn English with Your Family and EnSPIRE. In 2020, as Chair of the Association of Teachers, she developed an entirely new concept for the National Teacher Prize Ustoz 2020 competition, supported by the Uzbek Ministry of Public Education.
Nargiza says the British Council has influenced her work, both directly through the programmes she has participated in, and indirectly as she tried to implement her learnings for teachers of non-English subjects.
“Everything I do, I do for teachers,” she says. “My experience at the British Council helped me change my life, the lives of my students and the lives of other teachers.”