ISLAMABAD: As many as seven girl schools in the federal capital have been functioning for the last seven years without regular staff and necessary budget.

According to sources in the Federal Directorate of Education (FDE), these schools run their affairs on temporary arrangements.

Teachers from other institutions are brought to these seven schools to fill the vacant posts.

It has been several years since the establishment of these institutions but the FDE’s Planning and Development Wing has not seriously pursued their cases.

The FDE has yet to create permanent posts and allocate recurring budget.

Officials at the directorate, on condition of anonymity, said under the rules, these schools should not have been inaugurated till their budget and sanctioned posts had been confirmed.

But, the directorate opened these schools in haste and now the students are facing problems due to the absence of permanent staff.

“All these schools are being run with temporary staff borrowed from other institutions. But even then the number of teachers is insufficient,” said a deputy director at the FDE, who requested not to be named.

The schools that lack teachers and funds are Islamabad Model School for Girls(IMSG) VI to X G-11/1, which was inaugurated in 2009; IMSG G-11/2 opened in 2011; IMSG VI to X, I/14 and IMSG I to V, D-17, inaugurated in 2012; IMSG I to V, B-17, established in 2013, IMSG I to V, CBR Colony, set up in 2013, and IMSG Sohan, which started functioning last year.

The FDE officials said those schools which were inaugurated before the implementation of Article-25 A, that guarantees free education, were dependent on fees collected from students to run their day to day affairs.

However, in 2013, when the government implemented Article 25-A, these schools lost their source of income and since then have been struggling.

“We were able to arrange meagre funds for these schools but these are not enough, and until recurring budget is not fixed and sanctioned posts are not announced, the problem would persist,” said a senior FDE official, and added that on many occasions, the teachers had pooled in money to purchase necessary items for the schools.

Despite repeated attempts, FDE Director-General Shahnaz A. Riaz could not be contacted.

Published in Dawn May 16th , 2015

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