Education survey to be launched on 28th

Report contains new research on regional languages.

LAHORE:

The Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) Pakistan 2012 will be launched in Islamabad on January 28, Idara-i-Taleem-o-Aagahi (ITA) Programmes Director Baela Raza Jamil said on Monday.

The report of the annual survey, which has been conducted by the ITA and facilitated by the South Asian Forum for Educational Development (SAFED), was expected to be launched on January 21 but delayed owing to the political situation. The report will be launched in Punjab and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa on January 30, in Sindh on January 31 and in Balochistan and Gilgit Baltistan in February.

“The ASER 2012 will provide some unique information about the use of mother languages and the relationship between children’s learning and mother tongue education,” she said. The report had also collected information regarding the preferred medium of instruction and the mediums of instructions in vogue in schools across the country, she said.

She said the report would address the issues of implementing language policies in educational institutions to ensure better learning outcomes. “There is a disconnection between languages used in schools and the languages used at homes. This is worrying as regards to children’s learning,” she said.

The launch in Islamabad will be marked by a photo contest in which photographs taken by the ASER team during the survey will be showcased.

ASER Pakistan has been cited in the Economic Survey of Pakistan for the past two years.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 22^nd, 2013.