LAHORE, July 27: The Punjab Education For All Forum approved the provincial EFA plan of action for 2003-15 at its first meeting here on Tuesday, on the condition that the plan would be amended on the basis of its recommendations.
The meeting was presided over by the Punjab minister for literacy and non-formal basic education, Husain Jahanian Gardezi. The Punjab Literacy and Non-Formal Basic Education Department (LNFBED) will make amendments in the light of the recommendations made on Tuesday and publish the final document for a phased implementation.
Being a signatory to the Dakar Framework of Action, Pakistan is required to prepare national, provincial and regional EFA plans to achieve six targets of the plan by 2015. Sindh, Baluchistan, the NWFP as well as Azad Kashmir, FATA and FANA governments have already finalized and published their plans of action.
The Punjab EFA Forum suggested that the action plan must include ways and means to restore the status and dignity of teachers so that qualified people could join the profession. At present, the forum agreed, only those people were joining the teaching profession who failed to get jobs anywhere else.
The Forum also suggested that corporal punishment being given to students in schools must be checked as it was causing massive dropouts, particularly in the rural areas. It also called for a mechanism to check absenteeism among teachers and discuss their postings issue.
It suggested inclusion of more graphs and comparisons in the final document besides making it more readable. It was also suggested that the LNFBED should write an executive summary and include it in the final document.
Under the EFA plan of action, the major areas of focus are elementary education, adult literacy and early childhood education. The plan has prioritized the disadvantaged groups in both rural and urban areas.
According to estimates, three phases of the EFA Plan of Action for 2003-15 will cost a total of Rs183.474 billion. For the first phase (2003-05), the estimated cost is Rs19.456 billion that includes Rs9.379 billion as developing cost and Rs10.077 billion as recurring cost. Phase-II (2006-10) will be implemented at a cost of Rs61.746 billion, while Phase-III (2011-15) will cost Rs102.172 billion.
Making a joint presentation on the EFA Plan of Action, Prof Dr Muhammad Aslam Adeeb and Punjab DPI (Elementary Education) Muhammad Jamil Najam said the provincial government currently had resources of Rs1.553 billion for the first phase (2003-05), as against a requirement of 19.456 billion.
Presenting an analysis of elementary education, Prof Adeeb said the record of primary schools in both public and private sector in 2002-03 in Punjab showed that there were 44,255 government schools and 17,594 private schools. The EFA target for 2015-16 was to ensure 98,738 primary schools in place, including 64,238 in the public sector and 34,500 schools in the private sector.
He said the lack of facilities in the existing schools constituted a major factor in the massive dropout ratio in the province. He said that almost 70.8 children dropped out at the primary level of Class-I to VI, while a total of 82.4 per cent students' dropped out on completion of the elementary cycle (Class-I to IX). He said that only 17.6 per cent students actually went to Class-X.
He said other factors that contributed to the high dropout rate included parents not allowing children to go to schools, education being too expensive, schools being too far, education being not useful, children being required to help at work and at home and children not willing to go to school.
The government representatives, however, told the meeting that the Punjab government had launched a massive programme at district level to provide the missing facilities in all schools.
Prof Adeeb said the EFA aimed to increase the enrolment at elementary level gradually to attain cent per cent literacy by 2015. He said the plan would focus on improving quality of elementary education by enhancing teachers' vision and knowledge, making interesting and relevant curricula and creating a positive teaching and learning environment and a reliable evaluation system.
He said the plan would also focus on developing effective projects with the help of private sector to attract the drop-outs back to schools, eliminate gender-based disparities, promote quality, improvise a monitoring system from the provincial to union council level to obtain better results and ensure success of system.
He also identified the major constraints and the remedial measures devised to address the problems in elementary education. Speaking about adult literacy, Prof Adeeb said all illiterate people of over 10 years of age would be covered by the adult literacy programme.
He said only Rawalpindi, Lahore, Jehlum and Gujrat districts had over 60 per cent adult literacy. Six districts had 50 to 60 per cent adult literacy, nine had 40 to 50 per cent while 15 districts had a literacy rate of less than 40 per cent.
The EFA plan aims to achieve 80 per cent improvement in literacy rate by 2015 with a special emphasis on rural women. It plans to provide educational facilities to all individuals of society, manage technical education for those people over 14 years of age who might have missed elementary education.
It also aims to equip rural girls of 15 to 25 years of age with skills to enable them to generate income. It will also provide basic facilities to the working children so that they may get education as well as earn their livelihood. It will also improve facilities and services of middle-level education with non-formal education and community participation.
With regard to Early Childhood Education (ECE), Prof Adeeb told the meeting that a single room would be constructed in a school for the ECE centre. He said Rs80,000 per centre should be specified for provision of basic facilities. In total, he said, 23,833 centres would be established and 40,799 teachers recruited in three phases by 2015.
Speaking about the role of the Punjab EFA Forum in monitoring and evaluation, Prof Adeeb said it would be required to enrich coordination of districts with regard to educational plans, provide institutional and financial support to districts and ensure that funds allocated did not lapse.
The Forum would also have to create awareness, launch a motivational campaign and mobilize resources for the EFA besides proposing innovative programmes, projects, strategies and activities for the promotion of EFA.
It would also be required to ensure collection and reporting of EFA data and information to all concerned on a regular basis and ensure capacity-building of EFA partners.
Speaking on the occasion, Minister Gardezi said the final document of the EFA Plan of Action would help the provincial government know about the exact goals and the ways and means to achieve them.
He said the final document would also enable the Punjab government to hold negotiations with international donor agencies including Unesco and Unicef on a sound footing.
He said the Punjab EFA Forum would continue to meet on a regular basis to further improve the plan of action and monitor its effective implementation. The meeting was also attended by Punjab LNFBED secretary Abid Saeed, special education secretary Suhail Masood, additional literacy secretary Ghulam Abbas Sargana, representatives of Unesco, media and NGOs, MPAs, educationists and other stakeholders.
