07 Oct
This is held annually on 5 October to celebrate all teachers around the globe. It commemorates the anniversary of the adoption of the 1966 ILO/UNESCO Recommendation concerning the Status of Teachers, which sets benchmarks regarding the rights and responsibilities of teachers, and standards for their initial preparation and further education, recruitment, employment, and teaching and learning conditions. The Recommendation concerning the Status of Higher-Education Teaching Personnel was adopted in 1997 to complement the 1966 Recommendation by covering teaching personnel in higher education. World Teachers’ Day has been celebrated since 1994.
World Teachers’ Day is co-convened in partnership with the International Labour Organization (ILO), UNICEF, and Education International (EI).
2021 CELEBRATIONS
One and a half years into the COVID-19 crisis, the 2021 World Teachers’ Day will focus on the support teachers need to fully contribute to the recovery process under the theme “Teachers at the heart of education recovery”.
A five-day series of global and regional events will showcase the effect that the pandemic has had on the teaching profession, highlight effective and promising policy responses, and aim to establish the steps that need to be taken to ensure that teaching personnel develops their full potential.
H.E. Mwalimu Julius Kambarage Nyerere (1922-1999), former president of Tanzania and great African leader was known nationally and abroad as Mwalimu (‘teacher’ in Kiswahili), not only because he worked as a high school teacher in the 1950s, but also because he was a long-term advocate of the importance of literacy and education in promoting endogenous development, self-reliance, solidarity, peace, and social justice.
