ISLAMABAD, Aug 23: Educators of the present day need to know their responsibilities which have grown far more to reinforce their role as "intelligent communicators" with their students, Federal Education Minister Zobaida Jalal said on Monday.
She was speaking as chief guest at the national consultation on 'Citizenship Rights & Responsibilities Pakistan (CRRP)'. The discussion focused on citizenship, human rights & conflict resolution education.
Teachers in the 21st century cannot teach (whether it is a developed or developing country) as if students are passive and are like empty vessels to be filled up. "Though our education policy provides adequate support to the notion of teachers as active pedagogues, there are gaps in actual implementation, as we observe in classroom practices, which remains a challenge," the education minister underlined.
Being appreciative of the CRRP, she said, it was a timely initiative, helping the country push forward the agenda for a tolerant and enlightened Pakistan. Under the CRRP, the focus has primarily been on educators in schools and training institutions. These educators, in turn, will become proponents of rights and responsibilities, fostering a culture of learning, she said.
Referring to the Education Sector Reforms Action Plan 2001- 2005, Ms Jalal said its objective was to develop human resource in Pakistan as a pre-requisite for global peace and prosperity.
It also promotes quality education, enabling all citizens to reach their maximum potential; produce responsible, enlightened and skilled citizens and integrate Pakistan into global framework of human-centred economic development, she added.
She said the recently-held national students convention was symbolic of the substantive attention that must be given to youth who comprised 25 per cent of the country's total population.
They are perhaps the most energetic citizens of the country who can be mobilized for social dialogues through new interactive methods of sharing knowledge, skills and attitudes so that they can contribute to a stronger and more tolerant Pakistan, she added.
She was of the view that after 57 years, Pakistan had started moving towards its mature phase, where controversies concerning education could be debated creatively; where respect for diversity must be articulated and practised as firmly stated in the Constitution of Pakistan and Islam.
"From a policy perspective, whilst the umbrella provisions are in order, we need to revise our schemes of work in curricula, curriculum of teachers education and approaches in pedagogy to ensure that these are consistent with the ideology of Pakistan," the minister said.
All this is an interactive and ongoing process of continuous improvement and there is great deal to be done in this regard, she added. "We are firmly committed to the implementation of the action plan to honour our national and international pledges to various International Labour Organization (ILO) conventions," she said. She said Unesco, Unicef, UNFPA, ILO and Jica had been actively supporting these initiative, and "I would urge them to continue to support us".
