Peshawar records second-worst performance

Kohistan was the worst-performing district while Lower Dir was best- performing area

While the PTI has been claiming how it has improved education in the province over the past five years, a government review has ranked the provincial capital—which served as the party’s seat of power during its tenure—as the second worst performing district of the province in terms of improving education for May 2018.

According to the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Elementary and Secondary Education Department (KP-ESED) District Performance Evaluation System (DPES), a monthly ranking of all districts on the basis of set indicators, Kohistan has been declared as the worst performing area with a score of 63.25.



It is immediately followed by Peshawar at second with a score of 64.41.

Bannu follows at a distance with a score of 72.14 and Dera Ismail Khan on number four with a score of 72.28.

In light of the report, a meeting was held at the education directorate on Wednesday which was chaired by the Caretaker Education Minister Dr Sara Safdar.

With support from DFID, ESED had developed a quantitative index to calculate the scores of all districts based on 20 indicators. These included indicators such as student learning outcomes in the fifth and tenth grades, attendance rate, and progress on development projects in schools, enrollment, and provision of textbooks to students, percentage of provision of stipends, percentage of actions on online action Management System, percentage of functional PTCs, delivery of furniture, optimal student-teacher ratio and teachers’ attendance in schools.

The report found a substantial increase in the overall performance of districts for the month of May.

Lower Dir was top with a score of 79.1. It was followed by Swabi and Malakand with scores of 77. Torghar fifth with a score of 76.5.

The objective of DPES is to assess district performance on key education indicators in line with education sector plan and to introduce recognition for better performance. Every month, KP E&SE conducts district ranking to promote inter-district learning to accelerate performance.

According to the official statement of KPESED the DPES mechanism has evolved since October 2017. For instances, contextual factor indicator was included this year which includes the Multidimensional Poverty Index (SDPI), Roads Deprivation (BOS), filled positions in basic pay scale (BPS) grade 16 and above, and the budget released against allocated (PIFRA).

The monthly change in performance was calculated using indicators that have structurally remained the same in the two consecutive months. According to the results, 20 out of 25 districts have shown improvement in results relative to previous month's performance this time.



In a short span of time there has been a significant development in the number of indicators such as percentage of online actions completed increased by five per cent, provision of girls stipend increased by 64 per cent, provision of furniture items by 12 per cent, percentage of playgrounds established rose by two per cent, upsurge in SQMI visits completed by 37 per cent.

There was also a three per cent increase in the number of schools with all basic facilities; electricity, boundary wall, toilets and drinking water facility and 42 per cent of the permanently non-functional schools have been made functional.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 28^th, 2018.