Professor Dr Fouzia Naeem Khan is currently the Dean of the faculty of Social Sciences and Media Sciences as well as the Head of Student Affairs at SZABIST. She did her Masters and Post Magistral Diploma from the University of Karachi in 1991 and was married the following year. After focusing on her children for a few years, she did her PhD in Professional Psychology from Bahria University, Islamabad, in 2001. Along with this, she has done several other courses including an internship at PNS Shifa.

From her early days, she has been very enthusiastic about education. In 1995, she joined the education department in the Sindh Government where she worked for 10 years. She then joined the Social Sciences department at SZABIST in 2004. As to why she went into this field, she says “It was a very conscious decision as I felt I could relate well to students. Also it was my primary concern at that time that more and more students were opting to study abroad and I wanted to bring this to light. Also education is the basis for changing the economic and socio-political state of a country and I wanted to contribute to that.”

Despite hailing from Swabi, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, which is rife with tribal culture, she has managed to come this far. “Although Swabi has the highest literacy rate in that region, however, due to typical tribal culture, women education is not prioritised; however, my mother always supported and motivated me to strive for the highest level of education. Whatever I am today, is only because of her tireless support and encouragement and her courageous efforts against all discouraging elements.”

Due to having experienced this state of affairs first hand, she firmly believes that women education should be highly prioritised and that women have the power to take this country forward. “Being 53-57 per cent of the total population, it is high time for women education, skill development and vocational training to be prioritised at all government and private levels so as to increase the national productivity and output levels, reduce poverty and improve living standards for present and future generations of Pakistan.”

However, this dream may be far from coming true any time soon. The education system in Pakistan is in shambles and hardly any budget has been allocated to it on a national level. The 2010-11 Budget has promised no better to the people of Pakistan. Dr Fouzia Khan is hurt by the government's decision. “How can we knowingly keep less than 10 per cent of GDP for education in the budget and over 50 per cent for defence? The root cause of our problems is lack of education leading to lack of opportunities for employment which in return is giving rise to criminal and terrorist activities.”

It is this very state of the education system that is Dr Fouzia's main concern. The education system is divided in such a way that it creates classes between the people according to which school or university they attend. “Already it is faring very poorly, and add to that the different levels, one for elite, one for urban and another one for rural areas. It is a totally mismanaged sector with such visible discrimination that any conscientious person would be ashamed to be a part of it.”

Apart from this, there are many other imperfections in the system that she is unhappy about. Amongst them are “The discriminatory standards of private schools vs public (government) schools and madressah schools. Add to this the low standards and lack of teachers' training. These teachers also encourage rote learning instead of knowledge seeking and make their students more degree and certificate focused rather than learning focused. Also, there are a number of quick profit seeking vultures who force their cronies in the government to change the syllabus frequently so they can make tons of money through printing of new syllabus.

Cheating is also rife in the system and there are stories about leaked papers and new and advanced methods of cheating whereas it would be better if the same approach was applied to education where new and advanced methods could be applied to obtain latest knowledge on learning methodology and updating syllabus.

Dr Fouzia has noticed that all the sections of the education system are facing one problem or another. “Primary education is suffering from entrepreneurship; private schools are money-making corporate businesses rather than education institutes. Young inexperienced students are hired at low wages to teach the future architects of the nation. Garbage in-Garbage out. As for secondary education, majority of government colleges are infested with political groups seeking membership and are busy in transforming the new comers and youngsters into gunslingers and power players with tendencies towards criminal activities. And the higher education has severely depleting standards due to low standards of primary and secondary education. It is purely degree-focused.”

However, she does believe that all hope is not lost yet since there are ways to fix these problems if an active approach is taken to do so. With her advanced thinking, Dr Fouzia chooses to go for the radical approach. “It should be made compulsory that the children of government servants, parliamentarians and armed forces must and only attend government schools and colleges; this will help to improve the standard of both primary and secondary level of education.” There needs to be an improvement in teaching and the general level of standards across the system. “There should be a removal of discriminatory standards and various levels of education systems to gradually form a unified national level of education system. Also, there should be the highest level of teachers' training and better incentives, so they have no problems in relocating, if required, even to rural areas.” In the long run, Dr Fouzia foresees a world class national education system backed by long term education policy that should not be changed with every change in government.

As an educationist and a media person, she strives to highlight the shortcomings of our education system at every possible forum, and offer solutions. “I am trying my best to create awareness, a nationalistic approach and a deep patriotic sense in my students. It might be just a drop in the ocean, but I am positive that it will become a wave when other like minded drops join me to bring about the inevitable change.”