KARACHI, Aug 24: The board of governors of the Sindh Education Foundation (SEF) has approved the establishment of an endowment fund for the SEF while its budgetary allocation by the Sindh government has been increased from Rs150 million to Rs200 million.

Sindh Chief Minister Syed Qaim Ali Shah presided over the meeting of the SEF board at the CM’s House on Friday.

The meeting also decided to conduct internal audit of accounts together with other audits.

Speaking on the occasion, the chief minister said that the present government had emphasised the need to provide maximum facilities for development and promotion of education and health sectors in the province.

He said that maximum amount of funds had been allocated for education and health sectors.

He asked educationists, teachers, students and parents to fully devote their attention towards learning, studying, teaching, research and work for betterment of the education sector particularly in less developed and remote parts of Sindh.

He stressed the need for attaining international standards in the education sector.

The participants in the meeting reviewed a 12-point agenda, made decisions on important issues and approved the minutes of the last meeting.

Sindh Education Foundation chairperson Prof Anita Ghulam Ali and SEF managing director Aziz Kabbani in a briefing informed the participants in the meeting that the foundation had completed twenty years of performance.

With regard to institutional progress and performance of four years (from 2008-2012), it was told that the SEF was providing financial and technical support to at least 2,403 educational institutions in all districts of the province which included 250 community schools (RBCS), 150 government schools (ELP), one child development centre in Karachi and 30 community supported schools while 1,785 new and existing private schools (1,300 IELP and 485 PPRS), 23 women literacy and employment centres, one jail school (Sukkur), 30 community learning centres and 133 government adopted schools.

Mr Kabbani said that 7,995 teachers had been provided employment under different educational schemes and a total of 253,624 students enrolled during the 4-year period.

With regard to SEF partners as school operators/ adopters and non-governmental organisations, the meeting participants were informed that there were 10 NGOs under RBCS, 646 OPS under IELP, 347 ENTs under PPRS, 52 adopters under AAEP, two NGOs under WLEP and one NGO under CLC.

It was stated that a total of 130,500 course books of Grade 1, 2, 3 and 4 were provided by the SEF to PPRS schools, 72,000 course books of Behtareen levels, 64,000 course books of Taiztareen levels provided to NGOs for students enrolled in RBCS schools.

The SEF had further trained 4,000 teachers and school operators while students’ assessment in the year 2011-12 had also been made, the meeting participants were told.

It was proposed that schools in Katcha and desert areas would be included under the Sindh Education Foundation for imparting education there.

The meeting participants were also informed that this year there was a new scheme of opening 200 schools in Katcha areas.

It was decided that educational institutes under the SEF up to primary level would be registered with the Sindh education department with a condition of imparting mandatory Sindhi language education under the law.

Senior Sindh Education Minister Pir Mazharul Haq, Information Minister Sharjeel Memon, SEF chairperson Anita Ghulam Ali, retired Justice Zahid Qurban, Sindh chief secretary Raja Muhammad Abbas, additional chief secretary (P&D) Israr Malik, principal secretary to the CM Mohammed Siddique Memon, Sindh finance secretary Naveed Kamran Baloch, works and services secretary Dr Atta Panhwar, special secretary of education Riaz Memon, SEF managing director Aziz Kabbani and others attended the meeting.—APP