Jawaan

PAKISTAN is getting ready for the election process. Assemblies will be formed and hopefully complete their tenure. New policies will be planned and many reforms will be introduced. However, it is good to keep the major concerns of the nation in view before planning policies. Although, everyone is familiar with concerns of education in Pakistan and the previous governments had been taking initiatives to improve the condition of education in the country, it is always good to revisit and restate the issues so that no one forgets them. The following are some concerns of education in Pakistan.

In spite of the educational reforms and interventions that the government introduced, Pakistan has had a very slow pace of progress in education when compared with the developing countries which received independence more or less in the same years. The objective of universalisation of primary education is still to be achieved and the whole education system lacks in both counts of quantity and quality. Education in Pakistan is a topic which is discussed many times but hardly ever is something done for it practically. The Government of Pakistan relies heavily on external funds and keeps very little from its own GDP for education. Throughout the history, allocation of the budget for education in Pakistan has remained far below four per cent, which is the minimum requirement identified by funding agencies and human development reports.

The educational sector is poorly funded. It therefore has many problems. One of these is the unavailability of resources, that is, physical resources, financial resources and human resources. I myself visited more than 30 schools in four districts of Sindh, namely, Hyderabad, Thatta, Kairpur and Sukkur and have found government schools in these districts in a poor condition.

During my visit to Thatta, I found that one of the schools in Bathero was functioning in a tent. Similarly, a school in Sakkro was running in a hutch-like structure made with hay. When I enquired about this, the head teacher told me that the school had only one room therefore the local community had constructed the tent to teach the students in separate classes. The same teacher told me that there were almost 1,000 single-room schools in the district with a multi-grade classroom scenario.

The other three districts (Hyderabad, Khairpur and Sukkur) also have single-room schools but the situation is comparatively better in Hyderabad and Sukkur. The condition of schools in other provinces is also not so encouraging.

Apart from physical facilities, there are many schools throughout the fewer provinces which are under-staffed. There are two major reasons for this. The first is the less number of appointed teachers by the government and the second is political influence of the elected or selected members. Many schools in the district of Thatta were seen under-staffed and therefore various NGOs had hired volunteers and local people on no pay or a low pay to help the teachers teach the students.

However, there was evidence of political influence too. For example, one of the schools in a remote area of Khairpur was under-staffed and hence each teacher was taking care of two classes simultaneously. The situation was inversed in another school from the same district but situated in a city area. In this school, there were two teachers in each of the classrooms. When I inquired about this from the head teacher, I found that teachers, particularly female ones, did not want to go to the remote areas, therefore, they built up pressure on the government officials and got themselves appointed in schools located in the city area.

Another evidence of political pressure was found in another district of Thatta. There was a school functioning under a tree with only a few student benches, a teacher’s table, a teacher’s chair and a blackboard hanging from a tree. When I inquired about this from the teacher, I found that the school had a building with two rooms and small courtyard but it was occupied by a government official.

Another problem in relation to funding is lack of teacher motivation. Many teachers, particularly in the remote areas of different provinces, work as servants in the landlords’ houses or fields to meet their family needs. This is because the salary scales of teachers are very low. According to the government, the salaries of the teachers, particularly primary teachers, are even lower than domestic servants.

The human capital hypothesis suggests that investment in education is conceptually identical to an investment in physical capital. Therefore, the Federal Government of Pakistan should never let the budget of education go below four per cent. In fact it should gradually increase year by year. To reduce political pressure on the schooling system, there should be a sound monitoring and evaluation system.

Apart from the unavailability or lack of physical, human and financial resources, teachers are poorly prepared for teaching. They use traditional methods of teaching and often award corporal punishments. They rely heavily on tests to assess students’ performances and do not use ongoing assessment techniques such as observation, oral questions, project work and so on. Therefore they are unable to change their classrooms into thinking classrooms. It is also seen that most of the college and university lecturers and professors are not trained in pedagogical skills. I believe, all teachers, whether they are teaching in schools, colleges or universities, require pedagogical training. Therefore, there should be a sufficient amount of funding available to educate school teachers and college and university lecturers and professors. Funding agencies and generous people should also be encouraged to pool funds for introducing in-service programmes in schools, colleges and universities.

Another major problem attached with the issue of education is that students as well as parents do not believe that acquiring education is an end in itself. In terms of human development objectives, education is an end in itself, not just a means to an end. However, most of the people are unaware of the enduring benefits of education. Therefore, community awareness programmes should be introduced by involving media, street theatre groups, puppeteers and so on to create awareness, particularly among the people of the remote areas of the country. These groups should highlight the positive impact of education on the local economy (education helps in increasing daily wages of educated labourers and in increasing agricultural growth), family health, family planning and so on.

As indicated earlier, one of the main focuses of almost all the policies was universalisation of primary education. This focus was the right focus. Investment in primary education has emerged as a powerful engine for accelerating economic growth. Different countries, particularly South Asian countries, have used primary education to increase their economic growth. In contrast with higher education, primary education can be provided even to the masses by using minimum resources. However, there is empirical evidence that those who acquire only primary education, revert back to illiteracy after a passage of time. Therefore our focus should be universalisation of elementary education (classes I to VIII) in the future rather than just primary education. Those who will successfully complete an elementary education will not only increase the literacy rate of the country but also ensure sustainable education.

In addition to elementary education, we also need leaders and policy makers. Therefore, with elementary education, the government should also concentrate on tertiary education. The 21st century is the century of knowledge. Knowledge is required to utilise a country’s natural resources effectively. Those countries which have knowledgeable people will be able to use their resources well but those which have none or less knowledgeable people will be left behind. We therefore cannot neglect higher education.

A problem attached to the current higher education is that the length of our university study is almost two years less than that of the international courses. On the other hand, some unauthorised institutes (colleges or universities) are educating students whose degrees are not accepted nationally and internationally. Therefore, the government should strictly follow the assessment and implementation policies of the Higher Education Commission (HEC) to align our higher studies with international standards. However, there are some institutions here, which are affiliated with foreign universities and are extremely good in terms of the teaching and learning environment. Their degrees need to be recognised.

To conclude I would say, there are many points to be highlighted but whatever is mentioned here is enough as a starter. Let us hope for a bright future.