Government’s single national curriculum is like martial law
Geo.tv takes an inside look at the government s Single National Curriculum, feasibility of using it for Pakistani students
By
Updated Monday May 03 2021
In the PTI government’s grand vision for a unified educational system for all of Pakistan, it seems that children of minority communities have no space.
Article 22 of the Constitution of Pakistan safeguards the rights of minorities and states that “no person attending any educational institution shall be required to receive religious instruction … if such instruction relates to a religion other than his/her own.”
Yet, Lahore-based public policy expert Peter Jacob and a team of educationalists have found that 9% of the content of the class 3 English textbook of the government’s recently introduced Single National Curriculum is in violation of Article 22.
Pakistan minorities await implementation of historic ruling
Vested interests blamed for interfering with the progress of a Supreme Court judgment to protect minority rights
New research assessing the Pakistan Supreme Court’s 2014 judgment to protect minority rights predicts its implementation will take more than two decades.
“During this period, a Supreme Court bench has conducted 23 follow-up hearings and passed nearly six dozen orders, yet Pakistan stands 21 years away from the finish line of full implementation, considering the existing pace of compliance,” the study states.
“The federal government reported the least number of compliance reports. No report had been submitted from Gilgit-Baltistan and Azad Jammu and Kashmir. Reportage from the Ministry of Religious Affairs and Interfaith Harmony and Ministry of Federal Education was in particular missing.”
Opinion: The Cambridge exams conundrum has no easy solution
By
Saturday May 01, 2021
Last year’s handling of the IGCSE and O/A-Level exams by Cambridge Assessment International Examinations (CAIE) had to be MacGyvered at the last moment.
Schools had to assemble student portfolios in a rush, predict grades and rank students. CAIE then ran a normalisation algorithm to produce a grade. This initial approach produced such problematic results that it had to be shelved a week after the initial release of grades, and students were assigned their schools’ predicted grades. As the pandemic dragged on and schools remained closed, there was a possibility exams would not be held in 2021 either. The responsible thing to do was to remain prepared and build student portfolios from the start.
80 blended learning classrooms to be built in FDE schools
Islamabad
April 30, 2021
Islamabad : The Knowledge Platform, Pakistan’s leading education technology company, has won the federal government’s first public sector blended learning project for middle schools after a competitive bidding process.
Under the project, a pilot of 80 blended learning classrooms will be implemented in federal government schools in Islamabad.
Shafqat Mahmood, the minister of federal education and professional training, attended the project signing ceremony.
Recently, the Ministry of Federal Education and Professional Training and the FDE launched a solicitation for pilot blended learning projects in primary (1-5), middle (6-8), and secondary (9-10) grades. Knowledge Platform’s blended learning solution Learn Smart Classroom has been selected for the middle grades after a competitive bidding process. The innovative blended learning platform will provide robust holistic digital teaching, lea
Constitution and the SNC
April 25, 2021
A lot has been written about the proposed Single National Curriculum (SNC) and how it is detrimental to the 18th Constitutional Amendment which has devolved education at all levels to the provinces. This amendment was the result of a democratic process that involved all major political parties in the parliament over a decade ago.
There is another constitutional aspect of education which is being violated by the model textbooks that the government is preparing for primary schools. As an educationist, I have gone through not only the SNC but some of the model textbooks as well. First, the Ministry of Federal Education and Professional Training has taken upon itself something which is not constitutionally in its domain. It should be focusing on what it is supposed to do – managing educational institutions that are constitutionally in the federal purview; and it should be working for the promotion of professional training in the country.