A GIRL from the slums works her heart out through her academic career and earns a place in the summer programme of an Ivy League university that students from elite backgrounds all over the world aspire to join. It’s the kind of endearing story that has universal appeal, and for good reason. The young lady in question, 23-year-old Anum Fatima, lives with her family in Ismail Goth near Karachi’s Steel Town. Her father, a driver for a private com-pany, could only afford to educate his five children at substandard schools until The Citizens Foundation came to his notice. This non-profit offers highly subsidised yet quality education at purpose-built schools in underprivileged areas across Pakistan. Anum’s sterling academic performance at the TCF school first earned her a place at the local Institute of Business Management, and now a three-month summer term at Harvard University.

Uplifting though this news is for a nation weary of largely bleak tidings, there’s a sobering sub-script to this story. In education, as in health, the government has increasingly taken its foot off the pedal, preferring instead to relegate to the private sector services that are its duty to provide and for which funds — however insufficient — are allo-cated in the budget. The decline in the quality of education offered by most government schools, and even private schools in low-income areas, is such that children who study there scarcely have a hope of a better future. Anum’s journey illustrates how quality education can unlock a child’s potential and transform his/her life. Government education too must be a vehicle for the younger generation to meet the challenges of the times, rather than function as an obstacle to progress.