Anum Aftab

From Cradle to Grave

Pakistan emerged on the world map on 14th August, 1947. Since then she has faced a number of troubles on her way to progress. These key issues are major are roughly affecting our society. Perhaps the greatest loss comes in the area of education.

The key to success for any nation lies in their concern and development of education sector. As the education is promoted in the nation this reduces the illiteracy rate which ultimately reduces the unemployment which is one the biggest curse on any nation. The education sector in Pakistan is over looked by the government ministry of education and the provincial government whereas, the development of curriculum and financing is done with the aid of the federal government. In the past little decade Pakistan education is continuously developing which is ultimately helping the expansion of the entire nation.

One of the downside which Pakistan education is facing is low investment of the public in this sector, which is only 2 to 2.2 % of the total GDP. Although the provincial government has stated to increase this to almost 7 % which would be a live wonder if achieved. The education system in Pakistan is comprised of 5 levels which include; Primary, Middle, High, intermediate and university (undergraduate and graduate degrees). The past data indicate that the literacy rate in Pakistan is increasing to almost 10% every passing year.

Education is the systematic process of instruction for the development of character or mental powers. The primary stage of education is of prime importance for the edifice of career. Reliability and compactness of this stage enables a child to raise a standard of his personality. Unfortunately the importance of this stage is ignored to a large extent in our country. The drawbacks are multifarious in nature and require considerations on the part of the responsible. They have just followed the same principle of making policies in closed rooms and draft curriculum which was followed in the colonial era. Even now a days in our country, both the public sector and private sector have the capacity to publish books yet not according to the psychological level of the subject. They have borrowed ideas from elsewhere in the world and feel proud to present it in seminars and workshops.  As modern education system are adopted in Pakistan which are taken from the British education system which is playing a fundamental role in spreading English level all over the state. The census shows that almost 18 million which is 11 % of the total population has total command on English language which makes Pakistan the 9th largest English speaking nation in the world and the 3rd largest in Asia. The education in Pakistan is carried in two major languages comprising of English and Urdu. As most of the curriculum are taken from the British education system which consists of Oxford press, another drawback is that this makes the normal education very expensive which goes beyond the purchase and buying power of the majority of the local people. Whether or not this is a direct result of Pakistan's economic problems, it is undoubtedly connected with so many resources directed towards the aforementioned debt payment, educational improvements are given and inordinately low priority. In addition, Musharraf's military dictatorship had understandably not placed great emphasis on education in Pakistan.

In term of population, low literacy rates are often observed with high population growth. A poorly educated population is unlikely to participate in family planning or any other form of population control. Poorly educated masses make Pakistan a poor choice for the foreign investors that it so desperately needs. Furthermore, the extremely low literacy rate among Pakistani women (24.4%) lends itself to a society where most women never enter the labor force, creating fewer incentives for them to limit the size of their families.

The parents of today are also responsible to a greater extinct as they are not questioning the effects of these curriculum. They just pushing their young ones and finally opt for tuitions, which is not the right solution. The amount they spend on borrowing ideas and then its practical implantation will be in my opinion far less than the amount required for the research to know the psychology of the subject (Pakistani Children). Then another drawback of our primary education system is that of different school system for varied classes of the society, again following the agenda of the colonial rulers, empowering a particular section of the society, typically known as the feudal lords, to run the affairs of the state and to be easily affected by the name of modernism, enlighten moderation etc.

Due to costly education many people are kept away from the reach due to unavailability of resources. The old expired curriculum has also decreased the quality of education as there is shortage of teachers and poorly equipped laboratories are the result of less concentration shown by the government by lesser resources allocation. After all these controversies Pakistan is struggling in the field of education and steps taken on national level are showing the willpower and  fortitude of the government and local people. Despite of this Pakistan produces 445,000 university graduates and 10,000 computer science graduates, which shows that still Pakistan has one of the highest illiteracy rates in the world. Another drawback the teachers are also following the typical attribute of punishing the students harshly. Schools' authorities in the private sector are also highly responsible for the poor status of primary education system in our country. They have interests in building of the students but to earn more and more money even they are also not highly qualified. The government should channelize and monitor the schools in private sector.

Being a Pakistani I request all the readers to pause and think for a moment as to where we are heading!

By: Anum Aftab