KARACHI: The Government will shortly appoint two supervisory teams of specialists with a view to improving teaching of science in the secondary schools of East and West Pakistan, it is learnt. Each of the two teams, to be headed by a UNESCO expert, will have five prominent educationists in Field Science, Industrial Arts, Agriculture, Home Economics and Commerce.

The specialists will visit the schools in their respective provinces and would suggest diversified grouping of elective subjects for the science students. They will also arrange in-service training courses for science teachers and headmasters, as recommended by the National Education Commission.

In the beginning, 96 secondary schools — 68 in East Pakistan and 28 in West Wing — will be covered by them. In-service courses will be arranged in 14 teachers’ training institutions. This number will later be increased to 100 schools in East Pakistan and 99 in West Pakistan. The number of teachers’ training institutions will also be increased. The number of supervisory teams will also be increased provided successful results are achieved.

It was observed that partly due to imperfect grouping of electives and partly because of lack of knowledge amongst the teachers, students do not take an interest in their subjects.

Published in Dawn, July 20th, 2014