Fee structures of Private schools were already sky high, closure of schools had kindled it much more. The government-run schools due to their affordability were been over populated but were also notorious for having dearth of basic facilities like shortage of teachers, deficiency of furniture, drop-out of students due to lack of educational awareness in parents, and many more but COVID-19 has disrupted our education and learning even more. Pakistan falls in the category of developing countries. Poverty rate, lack of awareness, illiteracy and lagging behind in the race of technology are spotlighted issues of our country, due to these issues educational institutes, their faculties and the students as well had faced certain problems in this time of pandemic.
Prime issue which students and teachers both were facing was lack of internet accessibility and its poor connectivity. Secondly, students as well as teachers (especially the baby boomers) of rural areas have no access to smart devices and also they don’t have much know-how of using these devices. Conclusively, the COVID-19 and the whole lockdown process has made great digital divide across the regions of Pakistan along with the income groups.
The ratio of non-serious students out here is higher than the hardworking students. Reason of this non-serious behaviour of students is that our education system doesn’t care about dreams and achievements instead it is all about shoving homework down students’ throats. There are no productive, creative and engaging activities for them. This behaviour of students increased its rate when education system suddenly took a U-turn from physical world to the digital one. No doubt accessibility was a problem but where there was availability, teachers were found complaining that their students were behaving in impractical and idiotic ways. Parents on the other side were unaware of class-schedules and testing processes of their children (as online system was never used before).
According to my observation there are a number of causes behind this weak education system. Firstly, when it’s about the teachers; most of them are there only to earn money and fame instead of encouraging and teaching their students. Secondly, loads of assignments, home-works and traditional testing systems have terminated the innovative, productive and creative ability of the children. Students of universities rely on copy-pasting the stuff just because their school instructors were unable to teach them self-study techniques. They are no more interested in learning because it has little to do with their practical lives. Thirdly, our leaders themselves are not interested in imparting quality education to their populace; allocation of educational budget and Mr. Shafqat Mehmood’s continuous decisions of closure of educational institutes are clear evidences. I don’t understand why our leaders are only busy in their own disputes instead of taking wise steps towards the development of this country and resolving the issues of those who have elected them.
Nelson Mandela once said:
“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.”
According to the government’s decision that the students of class nine and first year will have to appear in the exams for two years together without examining the fact that this may cause adverse effects on their future. No appropriate tread has been taken by the HEC about the future of university students. Whereas, the Cambridge has conducted A-level exams by strictly following the SOPs, saying that they don’t want to waste a year of students who are seeking to get enrolled in foreign universities, that means, future of children of Pakistan is not that much important as it is for the foreigners. This shows how much non-serious we are about education of our next generations. This was just a glance of negligence of our government regarding our educational future there are a lot more buried and hidden inside the ‘piles of files’ of our political leaders’ record rooms. Then we say Pakistan doesn’t develop and grow.
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