KARACHI: Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah has decided to overhaul the public sector education system to ensure that quality education is imparted to students in government schools.

“If we succeed in developing a good education system by inducting well-trained teachers, introducing quality curriculum and scholarships to girl students, we would be able to eliminate terrorism, crime and other evils from society without shedding blood,” he said.

The chief minister, who was presiding over a meeting to review the overall performance of the education department here on Wednesday, said the problem behind all our ills was illiteracy, which is why he had declared an ‘educational emergency’.

Referring to non-availability of basic facilities such as toilets, drinking water and boundary walls in thousands of schools, he directed Education Minister Jam Mehtab Dahar to ensure that toilets and water tanks, including drinking water facilities, were made available in all schools on a war footing. “I’ll urge you to take it as a challenge and provide all the missing facilities to the schools within three months,” he said and ordered the finance department to release the required funds.

He also directed the education minister to hold a review meeting of curriculum being taught in government schools in all the classes. “I want to see overhaul of the entire curriculum for which leading educationists, literary figures and other people may be involved to invite suggestions,” he said and added that in the first phase mistakes must be removed from the curriculum and consultative process for overhauling or introducing a new curriculum be started. The chief minister said he was also working to establish a state-of-the-art teachers’ training academy which would produce well-trained teachers who would then be inducted in schools.

3,000 teachers retire every year

It was pointed out that every year around 3,000 teachers retired from service. This, he said, showed that every year the education department needed over 3,000 teachers. “Let us develop a cycle to produce a lot of properly-trained teachers every year,” he said and added that the education system would not develop merely by opening schools.

Therefore there was a need to concentrate on improving curriculum, adopting new methods of teaching and developing a conducive educational system.

The chief minister also gave a proposal to make education in the public sector totally free, including exemption from examination fee. He directed the education department to work out the proposal in detail by collecting board-wise data of students appearing in examinations.

He said: “I am ready to improve education system and literacy rate all over Sindh, but for this I need support from every individual because without their support the objective cannot be attained.”

The chief minister also decided to give scholarships to over 300,000 girl students all over Sindh by paying each student Rs2,500 to Rs3,500 every month in a transparent manner so that the fruits of this scheme could reach poor parents in the form of completion of education by their daughters and help the government in improving literacy rate in the province.

He also directed the education department to work out detailed data of each and every school on union council, taluka and district level so that teachers’ transfers/postings could be made on a need basis.

The chief minister expressed his satisfaction when the education minister informed him that 1,759 non-functional schools had been opened where 55,816 students were enrolled.

He also decided to keep reviewing the issue at least twice a month for attaining the target of imparting quality education in public sector educational institutions as well as eliminating illiteracy from the province.

Published in Dawn, March 24th, 2017