Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Caretaker Minister for Information and Education, Ms Mossarat Qadeem stressed for integrated approach taking the civil society on board in the reforms agenda of education in the province. Without integrated approach, we cannot move forward as we know "education is to be a state concern" involving all stakeholders in fine-tuning the educational needs in requirements for the society. Therefore, this approach should be put on ground with the active involvement of the society.
This, she stated, while welcoming the participants of the donors' conference co-hosted by the government of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and GIZ and participated by the representatives of UNICEF, USAID, EU Cooperation, AusAid, CIDA, SAVE the children, Norwegian Embassy in Islamabad, International Association of Japan, and DFID, authorities concerned of P&D and Elementary and Secondary Education Departments of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.
The participants were unanimous in identifying the problem areas responsible for low enrolment rate in quality education which included high drop-out rate push-out rate, weak learning output and the gap of professional and trained manpower and financial resources. The Minister said that we need to have a shift in policy from imitative approach towards innovative approach. We witnessed the weaknesses of the imitative approach wherein policies formed for the last 65 years and plans made and the best ones but those were not in consonance with the ground realities. The problems started when the civil society was totally ignored. The government and donors relationship excluding the civil society is a wall that should fall down. However, there needs to be a monitoring body to monitor the performance of managers, administration and teachers in the education system, she added.
The Minister said accountability and transparency should stay at the top and should never be compromised. We need a de-politicised educational system with the vigilant community and, fortunately, we have a vibrant media to indicate the weaknesses and raise the issues so that there is a "check and balance mechanism to bring about improvement in the education sector". What we need to do is to give schools with all facilities and the teachers present there, rest assured the female students would come to schools. She stressed for effective monitoring system, free from all sorts of interference including political and we would get results. The caretaker set-up wanted to sensitise the community and the opinion leaders to have ownership and this is a sort of integrated approach and all empirical studies indicated it as "success story" world over.
Expectations are around with the firm will and commitment, we can make a difference. Rest assured we would narrow down the financial gap and stop wastage of resources. The ultimate goal is quality education whatever approach is made, must have long-lasting impact, she concluded.
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