Fix the sector

Education Minister Shafqat Mahmood is working to launch a single curriculum across the country in order to uplift Pakistan’s education System. Is this initiative really going to bring an unforeseen revolution in the system? I think we have to wait for the answer. We must evaluate the current state of education in Sindh before this curriculum gets adopted across the country. Scores of state-owned schools in the province lack basic facilities such as the unavailability of drinking water, trained teaching staff, uninterrupted supply of electricity, access to laboratories and other related things.

Reports suggest that around 4.2 million children in the province are out of school. The number of girls dropping out of school is increasing at an unprecedented pace. Not long ago, the biometric verification system was introduced to trace ghost teachers and improve the system, but those steps produced no concrete results. A large number of private schools, on the other hand, are making huge profits by doing nothing much except advertising themselves as English-medium schools – a claim that attracts a large number of parents. Innovative educational reforms coupled with strong political will are needed at grassroots level otherwise the launch and the timely adoption of a single curriculum will bear no fruit.

Kamran Khamiso Khowaja

Sujawal