Planning educational emergency
‘What the best and wisest parents wants for his own child, that must the community want for all of its children. Any other ideal for our schools is narrow and…
Educational divide
WHILE basic education is a constitutional right of every child in Pakistan, millions of children and youth remain deprived of this fundamental means of living a quality life. The recently…
Planning minister Ahsan Iqbal calls for ‘sea change’ in HEC top tier
Planning Minister Ahsan Iqbal has raised questions over the performance of the country’s higher education institutions involving around Rs450 billion worth of development projects and urged the prime minister to…
Pandemic planning
WE finally have confirmation: at the time of writing, there are at least four confirmed cases of Covid-19 in Pakistan. One of the patients travelled to Iran and was exhibiting symptoms…
Local planning
ALL reforms are local and must be contextualised. Oft-quoted in the literature on local-level reforms, Micklethwait and Wooldridge point out that “the state is an incredibly blunt instrument; it gets…
Pakistan falls in human development
The global Human Development Report of 2023-24 has been released recently by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) from New York. Since 1990, this report has been presenting rankings of…
Girls in the classroom
The PTI government has thankfully completed its first 100 days in office amid the commotion of lofty claims, the search for a way out of the woods, and an oscillation…
A time bomb of illiteracy
Undergoing a protracted politico-economic conflict with Islamabad, Balochistan is a ticking time bomb of multiple social disasters. With immense strategic importance, abundance of natural resources, an over 700km long coastline…
Empowered teachers
IN the developing world, teachers have a role that extends well beyond that of educators. The change that teachers bring about not only impacts their students’ academic attainment, it also…
From rote to real
Education is often spoken of as the cornerstone of a nation’s future. Yet, despite this widespread acknowledgement, it continues to be treated as a ‘soft’ issue, overshadowed by seemingly more…
