A teacher is a person of great value in society and education is considered to be the holiest and distinctive profession. History is full of evidence of the nations where education has distinguished progress. The work and the value of teachers have brought name and fame to the nations. Teachers have brought winners of nations. The teaching profession has never been as difficult and demanding as it has become now. Global emphasis on literacy shows the concern of the world by the teacher's role in the development of society.

The professional qualification of teachers of any level requires an appropriate academic qualification that is not only related to their field but also to the fact that they are qualified enough to achieve the required academic goals. Academically qualified teachers refer to those who have academic training as a result of enrollment at the educational institution and the qualifications obtained as, B.Sc, BA, MA and so on; whereas the professionally qualified teachers receive professional training that gives them the professional knowledge, skills and techniques, as different skills of general education (Ahiazu & Princewell, 2011).

These academically qualified professionals have titles like, B.Ed., B.Sc. Ed, B.A. Ed, and M.Ed. and so on as their professional and academic achievement. Abe and Adu (2013) felt that teaching qualifications or teacher training is one of the series of academic and professional degree that allows a person to become a registered teacher. Competencies, in the field of education, are usually associated with a high professional performance.

The professional skills of a teacher have a proportional and direct relationship with students’ performance and their adoption of the academic skills. In the field of education, competencies have two different connotations. In theoretical context, it is a cognitive structure that leads to specify the behavior of the learners. In operational terms, competencies incorporate a variety of higher order behavior and skills that shows the capacity to cope with the unpredictable and complex situations. This operational definition includes knowledge, attitudes, skills, metacognition, thinking strategies and decision making presupposes conscious and intentional (Westera & Moore, 1995). (subject teachers and techers educators paragraph)

Statement of the Problem

The present study is comparative in nature it was conducted to analyze the gender wise professional qualification and competencies of teachers educators and subject teachers of education as well as to determine the differences between the professional qualification and competencies of both groups of teachers.

Objective of the Study

1 To analyze the gender wise professional qualification and competencies of Subject Teachers of Education and Teachers Educators

2 To compare the gender wise professional qualification and competencies of Subject Teachers of Education and Teachers Educators

Previous studies indicated the fact that lack of professionalism and skill in the teaching profession is like a suicide effect because they cannot provide education in that skillful manner in which a professional teacher with academic qualification can provide. Ngada , (2007; Seweje & Jegede ,(2005); Sail, (2005); Ruhela & Singh ,(1990).An unskilled person can fill up an empty space but can never play a role of a professional trainer who can train the students in a particularly designed learning environment (Karpati,2004). Teachers and their professional development should involve all facets of education. A global effort has to be made to enhance the value of teacher training with the help of training institutes and other related organizations (Guskey,2000). According to Carron and Chau (1996) the education of teachers should include the following: methodology, pedagogy, practices and curriculums.

As the study of (Guskey,2000) indicated that importance of teachers training and professionalism has been globally realized and teaching profession is certified and licensed by different organization and institutions. Carron and Chau (1996); Schleicher (2012); Hastie & Sharpe (1999) Johnson & McElroy, (2012) ; Zimmerman and Schunk (2001) explain different skills which teachers indulged after training for teaching effectively in the classroom. A study conducted by Lavin and Lockheed (1993) discussed that countries like Pakistan and other most of the developing world are facing the most grave issue related to provision of quality education to their coming generations. In this regard the most basic element is lack of professionally qualified teachers. It has been researched that the academic and professional qualification of teacher in Pakistan is poor (Rahmani, 2006). Tomlinson (1995) describes that competency is the constant ability of a person for the achievement of desired outcomes. The action of that capable person forced for the acquisition of anticipated outcome. ).Competence is the ability to deal with some kind of problems that arise at work. Moreover, a competent teacher has the ability to put a set of competencies in a-in-combination and successfully deal with the problems in a professional manner.

Overall, the competencies of teachers and trainers encompass skills, knowledge and attitudes which are necessary for proper exercise of their work. Darling Hammond (2009) quoted the fact that teachers’ efficiency can be seen in his/her effectiveness in classroom and teachers’ classroom effectiveness and performance largely depends on his/her professional competencies that how effectively competent he/she is while being in the classroom. Many studies highlight the idea that teachers’ enough knowledge about pedagogical content knowledge, curriculum knowledge and good subject matter knowledge have influential effect on their students. Shulman (1986) proposed the inclusion of three types of knowledge such as content knowledge, pedagogical content knowledge and curriculum knowledge must be a part of pre-service teacher training program. Moreover, the studies done by other theorists like, Sandar & Horn ,(1998) ;Raudenbush, Eamsukkawal, Dl-IbarKamali and TaoKlam (1993) also plead the fact that a teacher is the one who can perform a frontline role for the sake of improving the performance of learners. Alberto and Mahumane (2000) delineates the fact that limited infrastructure and deficient resources can also deliver a quality education with the help of assured teachers’ competencies. Myint (1999) suggested the joint performance of the teacher training colleges and institutes for the preparation of perspective teachers. This may help in coping with the needs and challenges of the society in a successful manner.

Shah (1995) also suggested following indicators for teachers’ education programs such as aims, characteristics, needs and expected roles of future teachers, the principal of policy goals and aims, findings of different researches and evaluations should be kept in view while selecting the objectives and content for teacher education. Ben Peretz (1995) believes that the curriculum of teacher education program should incorporate the foundation of education studies, professional studies, subject matter studies, workshops and supervised practices. Moreover, many researchers like Shulman (1986), Grossman (1995), Medley and Shannon (1999) consider the above mentioned elements as important to be the part of curriculum of teacher education. Kohll (1992) delineates the fact that a good teacher is aware of the academic affairs. Teacher must know academic matters and has command on subject and develop overall personality of the student. There are different models of methodological competencies of teachers as presented by different researchers and authors. Blazar. (2016) mentioned that teaching skills required of a teacher are writing instructional objectives, organizing content, creating set for introduction of the lesson, lecture, structuring classroom questions: ,questions delivery and distribution, management of response, explanation, illustrating with examples, use of teaching aids, variation of stimulus, reinforcement, pacing of the lesson, promoting student participation, using black board, achieving closure of the lesson, giving assignments, evaluating the progress of students, the diagnosis of student learning difficulties and taking remedial measures, measurement of the class. In contrast Blazar competencies Hammond et al. (2009) describes that a positive correlation between teacher performance and measures of teacher intelligence and academic ability, subject knowledge ,knowledge of teaching and learning, experience of the teacher about teaching and learning and learning difficulties are also important variables, teacher personality traits and behaviors as “flexibility”,” creativity “or “adaptability” also influence the student achievement and learning. Whereas as Hustler and McIntyre (1996) elaborate that teacher should plan the lesson according to the needs of students and prepare the lesson objectives before going to class and present the new lesson in an interesting way so that the lesson objectives can be achieved. He should divide the learning material in sequence and clearly formulate learning content, keep the atmosphere of the classroom good and pleasing during the teaching and learning process, maintain good discipline in the classroom, use appropriate questioning techniques and evaluation skills during the lesson for assessing and measuring the students’ progress.

Kyracou (1998) focuses on management of materials, guided practice, structured conversation, monitoring, use of natural language during teaching because natural language can be easily understood by students and helps them to understand the lesson, flexible material that can be changed during the lesson according to the level of the student, planning and formulating the lesson objectives according to the level of the student, conducting written test for judging that how much students perceive the knowledge given by the teacher during class and organizing and managing the class properly. The most important skill which Kyracous presents is the teaching experience which is essential for improving teaching methodology as well as he suggests that a teacher should possess teacher like personality and must have experience and knowledge of teaching and learning. Akbar (2002) explained some skills such as lesson plan, lesson presentation, lesson management, classroom climate , class discipline, command on the subject, checking class work, checking homework, appropriate teaching methods, inspiring confidence in students, formulation of appropriate questions, master as a personality, knowledge of the psyche of students, evaluation. Giving and checking homework are different skills given by Akbar as presented by earlier researchers. Bullough (2005) also describes some skills of teachers, which are personal responsibility, students’ capacity, opportunity to practice, maximize instructional time, students’ response, split the material into steps encouraging students to reason out and elaborate the correct answer, use of verbal questions and engaging students in verbal questions and answers. Teachers should use natural dialogue in the classroom for students to develop, expand and comment on the content to be learned, gradually shift some of the responsibilities for learning to the students, thereby encouraging independent thinking and solving problems and assignment home tasks. All the above competencies of teachers are very important to create a positive learning environment.

Study Population

The population of the study included all Govt. colleges and Govt. Elementary Teacher training colleges of Punjab. All the heads/Principals and students of Govt. Elementary Teacher training colleges and Govt. Colleges where Education was taught as a subject were the part of population. All Teacher Educators who taught at the B.Ed. and M.Ed. levels and teacher who taught Education subject at intermediate and BA level students were also included in the population of the study.

Sample of the Study

Multi-stage sampling technique was used for the selection of sample. At first stage, 10 percent of districts (4 divisions of Punjab) were chosen by simple random sampling technique. At the second stage, selection of colleges was made. All Government Teachers Training Colleges and Govt. Colleges of these selected divisions were considered in the study where Education was taught as a subject, by using a universal sampling technique. The respondents were comprised of three types of groups in order to measure competencies and professional qualification, i.e., the Heads / Principals (to measure professional qualification and competencies of Teacher Educators and Subject Teachers of Education), the Teacher Educators and Subject Teachers of Education (to analyze professional qualification through Performa of professional qualification) and lastly, the Students (to measure competencies of Teacher Educators and Subject Teachers of Education).

Research Instruments

The questionnaire and personal profile proforma were used for the collection of data from Teacher Educators, Subject Teachers of Education, Heads and students.

Data Analysis

T-test and Percentage were applied for the purpose of analysis. The analyzed data were presented in the tabulated form along with detailed interpretation.

We collected data from Teachers Educators and Subject Teachers of Education and Teachers Educators by using Personal proforma about their professional qualification i.e. Degrees, Diplomas, workshops, training etc.

Table 3. Frequency Distribution of Respondents with Regard to Professional Qualification

Table 3 shows the results regarding the professional qualification of the subject teachers of education and teacher educators. The subject teachers of education and teacher educators give views about the professional qualification respectively. A good number of (76.6%) subject teachers do not have any professional qualification, 20.6% have a degree of B.Ed and 2.6% have a certificate of teaching (CT) as a professional qualification. On the other hand, in the majority, (70.3%) of the teacher educators do not have any professional qualifications, 14.8% have a B.Ed degree and 11.1 % have an M.Ed degree and 3.5% have a certificate of teaching as a professional qualification. The above results conclude that most of the subject teachers of education and teachers’ educators do not have any professional qualifications.

Table 4. Gender wise t-test between Heads of Government College and Teachers Training College regarding competencies of the subject teacher of education and Teachers Educators

The above-mentioned Table 4 depicts the views of heads of Govt. Colleges and Govt. Elementary teacher training colleges regarding gender-wise competencies of the Subject Teachers of Education and Teachers Educators. On average, the competency of the male teachers is(246.97) and the female teachers are(201.64). The spread of distribution shows that the performance of male teachers is significantly efficient as compared to the female teachers’ this difference is very high and significant. F test is used for checking the difference between these groups. Its results show rejection of the null hypothesis in favor of an alternative that infers the existence of a significant difference between the performance of male and female teachers. As indicated, the p-value of the F statistic is given in table 4.94. Competencies of the male teachers are significantly different from female teachers since t statistic is (17.449) and P-value is less than(5%). So, we reject the null hypothesis for a significant difference in the performance of both groups of teachers.

Table 5. Gender wise t-test Between Students of Government College and Teachers Training College

The above-mentioned Table 5 depicts the opinions of students of Govt. Colleges and Govt. Elementary teacher training colleges regarding gender-wise competencies of the subject teacher of education and teacher educators. On average, competencies of the male teachers are (246.97) and the female teachers are (209.567). The spread of distribution shows that the performance of male teachers is significant efficient as compared to the female teachers, this difference is very high and a significant F test is used checking the difference between these groups. Its results show rejection of the null hypothesis in favor of an alternative that infers the existence of a significant difference between males and females. As indicated the p-value of f statistic given in table 4.110. Competencies of the male teacher are significantly different from female teachers since T statistic is (-7.772) and P-value is less than (5%) so we reject the null hypothesis for a significant difference in the performance of both groups of teachers.

The present study has analyzed the gender-wise professional qualifications and competencies of teacher educators and subject teachers of education. Differences existed gender-wise in the performances of Subject Teachers of Education and Teacher Educators. The majority of the male and female teacher educators and subject teachers of education did not have a professional qualification and they had MA education as an academic degree. According to the views of principals of Govt. colleges and teacher training colleges significant gender-wise differences found in the competencies of subject teachers of education and teachers educators in following indicators such as command over subject, uses of subject specific technology, lesson planning skills, lesson presentation skills, lesson management skills, maintaining social environment, utilization of appropriate methodologies, maintaining class room discipline, classroom behavior, formulation of appropriate questions in classroom, checking of homework and class work regularly, inspiring confidence in students, monitor student progress and provide feedback and usage of evaluation skills of the males teachers are significantly different from females teachers, According to the responses of students of Govt. colleges and teacher training colleges significant differences exist in performance of gender wise subject teachers of education and teachers educators in the following indicators of competencies i.e. command over the subject, design teaching program for desired outcomes of teacher, lesson presentation skills, usage of subject specific technology, maintaining social environment in the classroom, usage of appropriate teaching methodologies, maintaining classroom discipline, classroom behavior, formulation of appropriate questions, checking of homework and class work regularly, inspiring confidence in students, monitoring student progress and provision of feedback and evaluation skills of males teachers are significantly efficient as compared to females teacher. The significant differences in the results showed that the male teachers were more qualified and more competent as compared to their female counterparts.

The present study has analyzed the gender-wise professional qualifications and competencies of teacher educators and subject teachers of education. It was designed to examine and compare the professional qualifications, analyze and compare the competencies as well as compare the perception of heads and teachers regarding the competencies of Teacher Educators and Subject Teachers of Education. Subject Teachers of Education are those teachers who are teaching Education as a subject at an intermediate or BA level in colleges. For the present research, teacher educators are defined as those teachers who train the trainee teachers in Govt. Elementary Teachers training colleges of Punjab. Professional qualification of the teachers means that a teacher qualified with B.Ed or M.Ed degree, Training, diploma and workshop. For measuring competencies following indicators included: command over the subject, designed teaching program for desired outcomes, subject-specific technology, lesson planning skills, lesson presentation skills, lesson management skills, maintain social environment, usage of appropriate methodology, maintaining classroom discipline, teachers classroom behaviors, formulation of appropriate questions, giving and checking of classwork and homework on regular basis, inspiring confidence in students, monitoring students’ progress, provision of feedback and usage of evaluation skills.

Differences existed gender-wise in the performances of Subject Teachers of Education and Teacher Educators. The significant differences in the results showed that the male teachers were more qualified and more competent as compared to their female counterparts. The question is why male teachers are more competent as compared to female teachers. Men and women generally have different ways of teaching or describing something. Intelligence and talent are independent of sex. The quality of the teacher can be measured by the evaluation that he applies to the effective transformation of the learner by showing the specific science of his domain and preparing him for life with a critical, responsible and ethical sense. In some cases, no differences existed and in some matters, it occurred. It is the matter of competencies, experience and knowledge depending on the field as the few male teachers know their subject, teach it well as compare to females teachers. Every individual teacher has his or her own qualities and two teacher male or female cannot be the same. The personality of the teacher is always different. The ability to deliver a lecture, the interest, the teachers male or female take in student's problems are also different. Every teacher has some drawbacks and some unique qualities. Their view on discipline may also be not the same. Here the researcher specified this answer to the present study. The results of this research depict that male teachers are more competent than female teachers.

This study will be beneficial for male, female teachers as well as for future researchers. Female teachers may encourage enhancing their competencies to compete with male teachers in the field of teaching. Both male and female teachers need to get a professional qualification for improving their qualifications and competencies.