RAWALPINDI: The British Council and the Higher Education Commission (HEC) pledged to support All Pakistan Women Universities Consortium on Saturday.

The consortium was founded in October 2021 by Fatima Jinnah Women University (FJWU), Rawalpindi; Lahore College Women University, and Government College Women University, Sialkot.

The central idea of the consortium is to strengthen the collaboration among women universities to achieve excellence in higher education of women to enhance women development and empowerment.

At a meeting, 10 more women universities joined the consortium. They are: Begum Nusrat Bhutto Women University, Sukkur, Jinnah University for Women, Karachi, Government College for Women University, Faisalabad, Government Sadiq College Women University, Bahawalpur, University of Home Economics Lahore, Shaheed Benazir Bhutto Women University, Peshawar, Women University Mardan, Women University Swabi, Khyber Pakhtuknkhwa, Sardar Bahadur Khan Women University, Quetta and Women University of Azad Jammu and Kashmir, Bagh.

10 more institutions of higher learning join consortium to strengthen collaboration

The vice chancellors of these universities signed the consortium document and pledged to support women higher education in Pakistan by sharing resources, finding grounds of mutual interests and future planning.

Director Education British Council Pakistan Dr Nishat Riaz lauded the idea of women consortium and assured them complete support of the British Council in multiple forms such as technical, knowledge sharing, goodwill and financial incentives.

She said women must be involved in the decision making process at the policy level to ensure their empowerment, emphasising on the need of creating a conducive environment where faculty and student retention can be ensured.

She suggested multidimensional strategies for talent identification, youth motivation, career counseling and contemporary skill orientations for young women to unleash their full potential.

Lahore College Women University Vice Chancellor Dr Bushra Mirza provided a framework and suggested holding annual consortium meetings with partners to find mechanisms of documenting efforts.

HEC Executive Director Dr Shaista Sohail said established universities can support universities where women retention was an issue such as universities in Balochistan.

Being one of the founding members, Government College Women University Sialkot’s Dr Rukhsana Kausar assured her full support to the cause.

FJWU Vice Chancellor Dr Saima Hamid played a significant role in bringing all stakeholders together. During the meeting, she highlighted the progress of the consortium.

Under her leadership, a capacity building project with founding universities was recently completed. In this project, a team of researchers from consortium member universities worked with both women as well as general universities to support women belonging to the field of higher education in Pakistan.

In addition, a series of webinars and seminars were arranged in different member and non-member universities.

Published in Dawn, October 23th, 2022