The Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) 2016 published details about its recent survey of educational facilities in Pakistan.
The report depicts a horrible picture of the education quality that is being imparted in schools all over in Pakistan. It is based on a survey of 5,540 schools from 144 rural districts all over the country.
The Findings of the Survey
Launched by Idara-e-Taleem-o-Aagahi (ITA), ASER 2016 revealed that Pakistan’s education system has astonishingly serious problems.
Some of the shocking findings of the survey are:
- 48% of grade 5 students in rural areas are unable to even read Urdu stories.
- 54% students are unable to read English sentences.
- 52% students couldn’t perform a simple two-digit arithmetic division.
- 19% of children aged 6-16 years are not studying in schools.
- Pakistan has over 22 million children who’re not going to school, that is second worst numbers after Nigeria.
- 50% schools in the capital have no facilities like water or even boundary walls whereas more than 25% schools do not have a usable toilet.
- Only 36% girls could read sentences in Sindhi, Urdu, and Pushto, however for boys it was 43%.
- Only 33% girls are found able to read words in English whereas 40% boys could do the same.
- only 36% of girls and 44% of boys could perform a subtraction question.
- 48% students unable to read Pashto and Sindhi stories in their relevant provinces.
- In govt schools, 13% of teachers and 17% of students found absent on the day of the survey.
- 40% of the schools have no access to water, 46% do not have a useable toilet, while 35% have no boundary walls
Senior Program Officer, Nargis Sultana, termed that the government requires being held accountable for the mismanagement of schools, she also added that:
“Education should not just be amongst the priorities of the government, it should be the top priority”
At the launch of ASE report 2016, Joint Education Adviser at the Ministry of Federal Education and Professional Training said that it will prove helpful for future policy making.
An education campaigner, Mosharraf Zaidi, said:
“Due to the pressure exerted by civil society and NGOs, the government has started to take steps to improve the education sector, but there was much left to be desired.”
You can also read the full report with some very interesting insights here.
