I he two major certified providers of inservice education lor teachers in .Azerbaijan are the Azerbaijan Inservice fducation Institute and the Baku Inservice fducation Institute. Institutions of higher education. international agencies and organizations. and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) have a minor and generally non-certilied hole in the process. In Masters et al (1999). these institutes are collectively referred to as Institutes for the Improvement of Qualification and Retraining of Educational Staff. The Masters study refers to the former institute as the National (Head) Institute for Inservice and Retraining, and the latter as the Baku City Inservice Institute lor Pedagogical Personnel Training.
In an interview of the Minister of Education. Dr. Misir .1. Mardanov, he slated that "the inservice institutes had not satisfactorily done the work required of them in the past and that their work was very formal in structure." In the study bv Masters et al (1999). they corroborated the opinion of Dr. Mardanov. finding that most staff members were of very long tenure, that salaries were very low. that about half had outside sources of employment and income, and that most have little knowledge of new methods of teaching. The Minister expressed the hope that this current study would provide background information needed for a reform grant from the World Bank to make the institutes more effective.
