In our system, learning is for exams and not knowledge: Dr Jamil Ahmed

INTERVIEW

Islamabad

Abasyn University Peshawar Vice-Chancellor Professor Dr Jamil Ahmad insists his educational institution believes in expanding the intellectual horizons of its students rather than merely focus on their technical skills.

“Our management and faculty strives to imbibe in the students the desire to question the established notions, improve on cherished traditions, and broaden the scope of social and academic values,” he told 'The News' in an interview.

The VC said at his university, all the three stakeholders — management, faculty, and students — were busy in a ceaseless endeavour to set new standards and seek new horizons in higher education and to produce professionals with a new orientation, who could stimulate and lead the industrial transformation of the country.

He said the university had a vision based on five parameters — quality teaching, research, internationalisation, industrial liaison, and career and job placement.

Professor Dr Jamil Ahmad said both Peshawar and Islamabad campuses of the university had academic staff with substantial industry, research and teaching experience, while the curriculum of all academic disciplines was designed in collaboration with particular industry advisers to be on a par with the current global requirements.

“Our management and faculty integrate emerging international issues, experiences and standards into our degree programmes wherever required and prioritise the grooming and training of mind instead of cramming it with facts and information.

“We strive to imbibe in the students the desire to question established notions, improve upon cherished traditions, and broaden the scope of social and academic values,” he said.

The VC said the university’s faculty members totaled around 200, including 150 on Peshawar campus and around 45 on Islamabad’s, with 99 per cent of them having a master’s in their respective disciplines and that they were pulling out all the stops to ensure provision of quality education to students.

He said the university had planned to increase the enrollments on the Peshawar campus to 5,000 and on Islamabad campus to 2,000 in the next 10 years, while the size of the endowment fund would be enhanced from the current Rs68 million to Rs120 million in the next three to four years before raising it further to the level, where it matched the annual expenditure.

Professor Dr Jamil Ahmad said the university had acquired land in Islamabad’s Zone 5 near the airport to put up a purpose-built campus by 2020. On the education front, he said the university intended to begin MS programmes in various engineering, management, life sciences, and social sciences disciplines.

When asked if he’s satisfied with the country’s education system by and large, Professor Dr Jamil Ahmad relied in negative. “In our system, teaching or learning is meant for examinations and not knowledge; educational institutions are producing graduates, which struggle to find appropriate jobs for having education irrelevant to the market; most university heads are demoralised for lacking freedom to exercise powers, and universities aren’t allowed to set own curriculum and that they’ve to look to others for finances. All this necessitates large-scale reforms in our education system, especially on the higher education level,” he said.

Professor Dr Jamil Ahmad also complained about a lack of research in Pakistani universities and said even whatever the research was done in the country didn’t help address local issues. He regretted the growing incidence of plagiarism in the country’s higher education research and said the universities should nip the problem in the bud.

“When the students plagiarise assignments and get away with it, they’re so encouraged that they later plagiarise projects and thesis. In a bid to discourage such practices, we need to make sure that the students trust their abilities and do assignments by themselves. This is the  first thing to do. Besides, the examination system, too, needs improvement,” he said.

The VC agreed with the notion that by and large, the quality of university teachers in the country was not up to the mark and said the varsities should invest almost half of their budgets in faculty development by holding training workshops and professional courses.

He praised the HEC for being a good regulator for higher education in the country but emphasised that its policies should be one and the same for all universities.

“I acknowledge the role played by the HEC in ensuring better education and infrastructure at universities. However, there should be no discrimination (on part of the HEC) between private and public sector universities, big and small universities, old and new universities, and those located at good place and bad place. Once a university gets a charter, it should be treated like the existing ones,” he said.

Professor Dr Jamil Ahmad appreciated the ‘Jang Group’ for regularly organising Educational Expo in different parts of the country and said the event would bring all stakeholders from educational institutions to students to parents together for mutual benefit and thus, contributing to the improvement of the country’s education system.