Sindh launches of “Annual Status of Education Report Pakistan – 2014”

Karachi, January 29, 2015 (PPI-OT): Sindh Education Foundation (SEF) and Idara-e-Taleem-o-Aagahi (ITA) organized the provincial launch of the “Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) Pakistan – 2014” for Sindh Province today at Arena hall Karachi. The launch was organized to share the findings of the survey with those concerned, including major stakeholders belonging to the field of academics, practitioners working in the field of education and representatives from the government and media personnel.

Aziz Kabani, Managing Director, Sindh Education Foundation welcome the guests to the event. He said that it was inspiring to see although slight improvement in access to educational facilities and increase in literacy in Sindh. He said that the event was not only to launch the ASER-Pakistan 2014 report, but also a chance for the government officials to inform the audience about the initiatives that are being taken to improve the education status at the grassroots level.

Baela Raza Jameel, Director Programs-ITA, shared the findings of the ASER Pakistan 2014 in detail. She expressed pleasure over the fact that citizens can rise and collect extensive data in 14.5 weeks. She appreciated the talent that the citizens show to collect the door-to-door survey throughout the country. She lamented the fact that the citizens were not assigned the duty of the census and that it was years ago that the country had its census.

She called the ASER a ‘social movement’ of the educated individuals of the country. She also informed that label ASER was a brand under which various partner organizations are working throughout the process from conceptualization to printing of the report. She said that it was a welcome step in March 2013 when the Sindh Assembly passed the Sindh Act of Right to Education (Article 25-A).

She revealed the statistics achieved as a result of the ASER survey which was, according to her, citizen-led large-scale national household survey for the 3-16 years aged children. She called the ASER the largest data set to date which is being quoted in policy documents and reports at national as well as international level.

The ASER tools include Reading (Urdu/Sindhi/Pashto), Arithmetic, English and General Knowledge as categories. Assessments are based on Class II level curriculum for English and Class III for Urdu/Sindhi/Pashto languages.

Ms. Jameel informed the audience that for the year 2014, it covered 144 rural districts and 21 urban districts collecting information on 279,427 children (3-16 years) and 93,093 households in 4698 villages/blocks.

She said that Karachi-Malir has the highest in school children at 97% as compared to other rural districts of Sindh. She informed that 7% increase was seen in the trend of children enrolling with the private schools for 6-16 as well as 6-10 years old children. She called it a point to ponder for the government that can take it as a policy change to go for low-cost private schools in rural areas.

Talking about the dilemma of multi-grading in classrooms, she said it was alarming to know that 70% of class 2-3-4 sat together in 2013 and 74% in 2014. Honourable Dr. Fazlullah Pechuho, Additional Chief Secretary-Education, Govt. of Sindh said that there is also dearth of merit-based HR as teachers have not been hired on merit for the last 30 years.

He expressed his desire for conducting a policy dialog involving political parties, educationists and private entrepreneurs. He said that the Sindh Government’s policy of Adopt-a-School policy was a robust one in which institutes are given chance to ‘adopt’ schools by signing an MoU with the government.

He also mentioned that the Sindh Government was also framing a policy for Early Childhood Education as well as Non-formal Education in order to strengthen the education system at grassroots level from the platform of public-private partnership.

For monitoring of teachers and establishment of a system to bring absentee teachers to schools, the government is soon initiating a call-centre style setup to take complaints against the absent teachers and take action against them. At the launch, Mr. Pechuho said that the report is being launched in Sindh in order to improve the education standards in Sindh.

Dr. Muhammad Memon, Director, Hamid ul Kirmani, Professor AKUIED, gave a presentation on Curriculum Reforms and said that there are reforms being brought about in the Sindh education sector and he was an integral part of the process.

He said that curriculum is a mirror to see what quality of education is being offered to students. He said that the curriculum in Pakistan was devised on ‘top-down’ model with ‘quick-fix’ approach on ‘more or less the same’ outcomes. He lamented the fact that the curriculum transmitted the ‘official knowledge’ (ideology) and for this, he said, we did not need teachers who are agents of invoking thoughts into students minds. With curriculum designed as such, we would be better off without teachers but some preachers.

After the 18th Amendment in 2010, advisory committee on curriculum and textbooks is formed, which consists of educationists, civil society members and media personnel, and review of 2006 up to elementary level has been completed in Sindh successfully. He also stressed the importance of professional development of teachers to implement curriculum as lack thereof would not produce required results.

For more information, contact:
Rukhsana Laghari
Deputy Director Public Relations
Sindh Education Foundation
Government of Sindh
House No. 21-A, Block 7/8,
Overseas Cooperative Housing Society,
Ameer Khusro Road, Karachi
Tel: +92-21-34169141-2, +92-21-34169144-5
Email: info@sef.org.pk
Website: www.sef.org.pk