Educational reforms of Punjab government have been acknowledged while comparing with other countries at international level and the educational services of Punjab Education Foundation have been termed commendable. World renowned English-language weekly ‘The Economist’ has declared Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif as an active Chief Minister and written that Punjab province of Pakistan is a glorious example with regard to quality education.
The Economist has highlighted the strong role of educational reforms, espoused by the Punjab Government under the leadership of Chief Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif, to improve access and quality of education, as well as to ensure that children from all segments of the society get educational opportunities through Punjab Education Foundation. PEF is an autonomous statuary body under the Punjab Government and working in public private partnership with more than five thousand low-cost private schools in all the 36 districts in Punjab and catering to educational needs of two million needy children. The CM Punjab has committed to ensure 100% enrollment of all the children by 2018. For this purpose, it has been decided that all new schools will be opened through Punjab Education Foundation so that the targets can be achieved well in time.
The detailed story ‘Low-cost private schools learning unleashed’ takes full view of educational scenario in Pakistan, India, Mexico and Nigeria. Chief Minister Shehbaz Sharif is termed as “energetic” and a new standard-bearer for market-based educational reforms in the Punjab where Government is helping private sector to expand.
It is worth noting that the educational reforms under the leadership of Chief Minister Shehbaz Sharif have been appreciated as a successful case study. As a flagship program of the CM, Punjab Education Foundation has been doing a commendable job in ensuring equitable access to children from extremely poor households. They are provided opportunities to study in PEF partner schools where they are financed by the Foundation through its various public private partnership programs. The story mentions that PEF is educating about two million needy children and the number will rise to 2.8 million by the year 2018. It is worthwhile that this is the second time that Punjab Education Foundation has been projected as a case study by this reputed international weekly.
The said story also included a brief interview of Managing Director PEF, Dr. Aneela Salman, about how this Foundation is changing lives of lakhs of needy children through education. While giving details of various PEF educational programs, she told that one free educational scheme helps the entrepreneurs to set up new schools particularly in rural areas so that needy children in such remote and far-flung areas could easily access it. Through another program, educational vouchers are issued to parents mostly living in slums to send children, who are not in schools, to PEF sponsored schools. She added that funding for all the students is provided under another PEF sponsored free educational program. PEF partner schools cannot charge fees and must submit to monitoring and teachers’ training to ensure quality of education. Although the funding per pupil is less than half of what is spent by the government schools, results are at least as good, said Aneela Salman. While discussing the benefits of partnership with the private sector to promote education in the indigent segments of society, she maintained that private sector can be much more flexible about who it hires, and can set up schools quickly even in rented buildings and hire teachers from the local community.
The weekly noted that the Punjab is also improving oversight and working out how to inform parents about standards. It has dispatched 1,000 education department officials equipped with tablets to conduct basic checks on whether schools are operating and staff and children are turning up. In a joint study by the World Bank, Harvard University and Punjab Government, parents in some villages are given report cards showing test scores of their children and the average for schools nearby, both public and private. As a result of this reform, participating villages had more children in school and their test scores in maths, English and Urdu were higher than in comparable villages where cards were not distributed.