Public-private partnership: PEF to provide free vocational training to 35,000 students

Punjab Education Foundation (PEF) has planned to provide free vocational training to 35,000 high school students in 29 districts through public-private partnership. This programme is aimed to provide skilled labour-force to industry. This was stated by Chairman Punjab Education Foundation Raja Muhammad Anwar while addressing the "Symposium on Public-Private Partnership in Vocational Training- A New Paradigm" arranged by PEF, at a local hotel, on Saturday.
Giving the details of the programme, he said that secondary school students, deserving out of school 15-25 years old youth and housemaids will be imparted free training through TEVTA, NGOs and the technical institutions owned by the business community in Punjab. PEF will bear the expenses of this training, he added. Raja Anwar further said that this programme will be especially beneficial for jobless girls, matriculate students and out of school youth who, because of its socio-economic poverty, cannot start its own small-scale entrepreneurship or can take admission in any institution for want of fee. This programme is also designed to provide trained workforce to the trade and industrial sectors as Pakistani industry badly needs trained persons to lead it to compete in a competitive environment of globalisation, he maintained.
Pro-Chancellor LUMS Syed Babar Ali said in his address that nation-building requires investment on human resource as no nation can develop without it. He said that health should be another priority area and the children should be motivated to take part in sports activities. He said that LUMS, under its National Outreach Programme, has given admissions to the deserving and needy children of remote and less developed areas. Out of 2700 students in LUMS, more than 300 belong to poor families, he added. There is no dearth of talent in Pakistan.
Emphasising the need to educate girls, he maintained that girls are equally competent like boys. Therefore, girls should not be ignored in the vocational training, he maintained.
The function was also addressed by Chairman Bank of Punjab AZK Sherdil, Chairman LCC&I Shahzad Malik, Chairman TEVTA Saeed Alvi, Secretary Schools Education Department Aslam Kamboh, Pro-Rector NUST (Innovations and Entrepreneurship) Engr. M. Mushtaq, Director (Institute of Continuing Education) UVAS Dr Salahuddin and others. On the occasion, various business houses representatives presented their proposals to strengthen industry-academia linkage and need to provide market-oriented training to the youth for expanding their economic horizons.