With a view to promoting science education, Punjab Education Foundation (PEF) has planned to provide a grant of Rs 100,000 to each partner high school for the setting up of science labs. This was stated by Punjab Education Foundation Chairman Raja Muhammad Anwar while addressing the District Co-ordination meeting (DCM) of partner school Principals and teachers on Wednesday.
"PEF is the single-largest movement of public private partnership in education sector in Punjab. It has arranged free education of one million deserving students through more than two thousand partner schools in 29 districts," he maintained. Appreciating the role of public private partnership in education sector, Raja said that Foundation Assisted Schools (FAS) program students' number has increased from 0.5 million to 0.8 million and schools figure from 1338 to 1773 during the present government.
Similarly, furniture availability is also increased by 18 percent in FAS partner schools, he added. It may be noted that improvement in Quality Assurance Test (QAT) results is also witnessed as a result of better teachers training of partner schools. The fact that PEF partner schools have bagged 45 out of 87 top positions in Punjab Examination Commission 2010 shows educational standard of partner schools.
As teachers' training is an integral part of the school education, therefore, PEF is particularly working to improve capacity building of the partner school teachers/Principals. For this purpose, training modules have been revamped & improved and latest database is also developed. He also informed that PCs would also be provided to partner schools for setting up IT labs. This will bridge digital divide in society, he concluded. Later, he gave away cheques to students bagging top positions in PEC 2010 exams.