Overworked teachers distracted

Educationists say Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa schools still lack basic facilities

PESHAWAR: The government in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa has spent billions on providing educational facilities in the province, hiring thousands of teachers and even training them. But some say the teachers have been overburdened with additional tasks with distracting them from classrooms.

The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) led provincial government has spent Rs22.5 billion to provide free textbooks to students, providing missing facilities including boundary walls, group latrines, water supply, electricity, solar panels’ installation and construction of additional classrooms. This was disclosed in the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) Education Reforms and Achievements Report 2017.

The provincial government has also hired 40,000 teachers through the National Testing Service in order to bring the student-teacher ratio to 40:1 since June 2013.  More than 65,000 teachers have been trained since 2013 with an allocation of Rs800 million for better student learning outcomes.

They have also launched an incentive programme for teachers with over 2,500 tablets worth Rs89 million provided to teachers. Similarly, 1,000 best performing schoolteachers, headmasters and principals were rewarded with a total of Rs55 million during 2014-15.



However, All Teachers Coordination Council Spokesperson Azizullah Khan told The Express Tribune that compared to past governments, this government had nothing done for teachers except to harass and mentally torture teachers.

“The basic responsibilities of teachers is to teach students, but new experiments waylay teachers from their basic work and they spend their entire day dealing with Independent Monitoring Unit (IMU) representatives, conduct surveys and run enrollment campaigns,” Azizullah lamented.

Talking about the improvements brought, he said that much of this was on paper which was not reflected on the ground with thousands of schools still without essential facilities and furniture.

He added teachers have been protesting for their basic right of time scale promotions, but the government has been employing delaying tactics to deprive teachers of their rights.

Moreover, he voiced his reservations over hiring 40,000 teachers through the National Testing Services since all of these teachers were being hired on contracts.

About the training imparted to teachers, Azizullah said that the provincial government had started three-day training programmes for teachers of the province with support from foreign-funded organizations. However, he said that these it was almost impossible to enhance the teaching capacity of teachers in just three days.

Private School Network Spokesperson Syed Anas Tarkeen Kakakhel said that the government seemed confused from the first day and this fact was also admitted by PTI chief Imran Khan who noted that they had an inexperienced team.

“Due to lack of competent officers this government want to nationalize the private education sector all the while pushing the public sector towards privatization,” he said.

Tariq Mehmood, an education expert who has vast experience of teaching both, in public and private, sector appreciated government the reforms introduced by the government. However, he was of the view that the government should focus on some basic issues instead of wasting billions.

Moreover, he felt that teachers should be bound to assign and check homework of students apart from monthly tests with proper record-keeping.

Talking to The Express Tribune K-P ESE Media Advisor Najiullah Khattak said that the incumbent government has made records while working in every sector.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 24^th, 2017.