Federal education to receive almost 18pc more funds

ISLAMABAD: The Ministry of Federal Education and Professional Training will receive almost 18 per cent more development funding from the government in the next financial year compared with the outgoing one.According to the Federal Budget 2023-24 documents released on Friday, the education ministry’s allocations for the next year total Rs8.5 billion against the current year’s Rs7.23 billion with focus on the provision of missing facilities to schools and promotion of skills training.Most of the money i.e. Rs5.9 billion will go to 16 ongoing projects, while seven new projects will bag just Rs2.6 billion, including Rs450 million in foreign assistance. After the 18th Constitutional Amendment, education as a subject was devolved to the provinces, so currently, the federal government mainly finances its educational and training institutions and higher education initiatives.

The largest funding for ongoing schemes is for the provision of basic educational (missing) facilities in Islamabad’s government schools and colleges (Rs2.157 billion) and the PM’s special package to implement the “Skills for All Strategy” as a catalyst for the technical and vocational education and training sector’s development (Rs1.471 billion). The education ministry will get Rs400 million for setting up the Directorate General of Religious Education, Rs325 million for establishing the Federal Government College of Home Economics, Management Sciences and Specialised Disciplines, F-11/1, Islamabad, Rs250 million for building the Graduate Block in National College of Arts, Lahore, Rs225 million for putting up the National Curriculum Council Secretariat, and Rs200 million each for the sustainability of computer labs established by the Universal Services Fund along with the retention of 202 computer teachers in Islamabad’s girls’ schools and colleges, and award of 1,600 scholarships to students from India-occupied Jammu and Kashmir.

As for the ministry’s new projects, the skills development programme will take away the lion’s share of those allocations i.e. Rs1.5 billion. Rs250 million each will go to the National Institute of Excellence in Teachers Education and inclusive and responsive education programme, while Rs150 million each will be spent to enroll out-of-school children and introduce early childhood education classrooms in 192 primary schools in Islamabad.