By ANI

NEW DELHI: As schools and colleges remain shut or are affected due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, digital technology has a key role in imparting education, President Ram Nath Kovind said on Saturday.

Kovind, who was conferring National Teachers’ Awards 2020 in a virtual ceremony in Delhi on the occasion of Teachers’ Day, congratulated all the award-winning educators and highlighted that 18 out of the 47 awardees are women.

“Schools and colleges are either shut or affected due to COVID-19. In such a situation, digital technology has key role in imparting education. It’s important that you upgrade your skills to use digital technologies so that your teachings become more effective,” Kovind said.

He also expressed gratitude towards all his teachers and for their affection and guidance for enabling him in his journey in reaching where he is today.

“Good buildings, expensive equipment or facilities do not make a school. It is the teachers’ dedication and will towards their students that makes a school. Teachers are the true nation builders who lay the foundation of character-building in our sons and daughters to develop enlightened citizens,” Kovind said.

“A teacher’s real success is to make their student a good person, who are able to think and act rationally, with compassion and empathy, courage and wisdom, creativity, scientific thought and moral values,” he added.

The President said that teachers, who were struggling with education through digital medium, have worked hard in this short time to connect with their students online now.

“It is important that each of you use digital technologies to upgrade and update your skills thereby increasing the effectiveness of your teaching. Teachers need to partner with parents to promote online learning so that they can collaborate with children in the process and inspire them to learn with interest,” he said.

Kovind said that everyone also has to ensure that children across the country, be they in rural, tribal or remote areas, get the means of studying through the digital medium.

Speaking about the new education policy, he said, “Teachers should be at the center of fundamental changes being made in the education system. According to the new education policy, every possible step needs to be taken to enable teachers. Efforts will have to be made to select the most promising people in the teaching profession at every level.”