Federal Minister for Education and Professional Training Shafqat Mehmood addressing the launch of National Education Policy Framework said that enrolment of 25 million out of school children, provision of quality education, skill development, and uniformed syllabus will be the four pillars of the national education policy.
Mehmood said smart schools would be introduced with the help of technology to overcome shortage of teachers. He said education volunteers' programme would also be launched soon. Furthermore, teachers' training programme would be started and the National Skill University would also be established in Islamabad, he added. As a first step, the government would bring 27,300 out of school children in Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT) into formal and non-formal educational institutions.
The minister said Pakistan was facing significant education challenges in providing uniform and quality education to all children. "It systematically performs lower than its South Asia neighbours and countries with similar per capita income. Pakistan is also amongst the countries that have the world's highest out-of-school population."
"After 70 years of independence, literacy rate is 58 percent which has gone down from 60 percent, out of school children are 22.5 million while more than 41% of the enrolled children in primary schools drop out before completing grade-5."
He said that first and foremost education challenge was addressing the issue of out of school children (OOSC) and ensuring that enrolled children complete their education. Increase in enrolments across the country have remained static across the years and at times also shows a decrease in some provinces.