LAHORE: Meeting international quality standards is the biggest challenge being faced by the Punjab school education department, says Programme Monitoring and Implementation Unit (PMIU) Deputy Director (Coordination) Kashif Ali.

“The challenge cannot be achieved instantly as it stems from the absence of quality standards and weak coordination among implementers,” he said at a policy dialogue on “Countable resource allocation and spending on education” hosted by Idara-i-Taleem-o-Aagahi (ITA) and ASER Pakistan teams at a local hotel here, said a release on Sunday.

Punjab School Education Department Deputy Secretary Qaiser Rasheed said the budget allocation was now being made keeping in mind regional and gender disparities to not only bridge the gap but also to achieve the goals of 2018, envisaged by the department for itself.

Earlier, speakers at the policy dialogue said Pakistan was currently spending around two per cent of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on education, which was lowest in the region. Quoting the United Nations Development Programme, they said the completion or survival rate had declined in the recent years where more than quarter of students enrolled at primary level did not complete their education. Pakistan’s literacy rate stood at 58 per cent, which was well short of the targeted 88 per cent by 2015. Gender disparities and rural-urban divide were also some of the issues that had plagued a sustainable education development in the country.

Representative from the school education department, Directorate of Staff Development, PMIU, USAID and JICA etc. highlighted different initiatives taken by the Punjab government for effective resource allocation.

Published in Dawn, March 30th, 2015

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