A flawed education system can give birth to so many issues in the society. Intellectuals believe that unequal system of education lays down the foundation of social disparity. The case of Pakistan inevitably validates such point of view. All the children from the different social classes don’t have access to the modern facilities and advanced learning tools.
Such inequality does make sense in term of comparison between private and public sector schools. In case of Pakistan, such imbalance is visible in the institutes from the same sector. Different provinces in the country and even various districts in the same region are not able to provide equal education opportunities to their children.
Alif Ailaan, an NGO that campaigns for education in Pakistan has published its DER (District Education Ranking) 2017 report.
The report evaluates the status of education in public schools of Pakistani districts by Education Score, Primary School Infrastructure Score, Middle School Infrastructure Score and Beyond Primary Readiness Score.
Here is an overview of data from two main categories.
Education in Pakistan; a Provincial Comparison
The provincial education score shows that Azad Jammu and Kashmir leads with a score of 72.95, followed by 70.43 of Islamabad, 70.01 of Punjab, 63.18 of Gilgit Baltistan, 57.59 of KP (Khyber Pakhtunkhwa), 54.16 of Balochistan, 53.37 of Sindh and 49.01 of FATA. Education score comprises of the learning score, retention score and gender parity score.
Middle School Infrastructure Ranking Score
Middle School Infrastructure ranking score is based on the availability of facilities like Water, Electricity, Toilet and Boundary Wall. In this regard, Punjab leads all the provinces with a total score of 92.66, followed by KP 89.25, ICT 87.33, Sindh 66.29, GB 58.24, FATA 54.63 and Baluchistan 48.23. AJK has the lowest score of 40.85.
Addressing the Inequality in Education in Pakistan
The score mentioned above shows the difference in performance of public sector educational institutes across Pakistan. Such inequality exhibits in district ranking as well. The data is useful but inadequate in offering relevant insight to policymakers on the impact of education. It doesn’t include the enrollment in schools according to each province and district, which is necessary to fulfill the goal of making every single child reach a school. Students who look for How to select a University for higher education, also need such numerical insights to back their decisions. But such a comprehensive data that compares the status of education in different provinces of Pakistan can boost the competition among respective governments. Further policymakers can also make plans and devise policies to fill in the gaps and make better decisions.
