Of privilege: Visiting govt schools

I have won several awards for my academic performance during my school life. However, the achievement that I am most proud of is that I was part of a team that made a video documentary titled ‘Schools of Pakistan’, on the education system of Pakistan in the summer of 2009.

The privileged position I enjoy in society as a consequence of my education has inculcated in me the belief that I must return back to society what it has given me. Being a witness to the wide disparity prevalent between the private and government schools and the abject poverty, which prevents children from underprivileged backgrounds from attaining an education, motivated me to highlight these issues in the form of a documentary.

We set about to achieve our objective by visiting various schools, including those in shanty towns, and interviewed relevant personalities. We highlighted the shortcomings of state education and provided our suggestions for improvement. I consider this documentary as my greatest achievement as working on it was a real eye-opener and changed my whole perspective on life.

Not everyone has the same resources and opportunities in Pakistan. People from poor backgrounds have an extremely difficult life. I will never forget this lesson and a person cannot truly understand this without seeing the state of government schools with their own eyes. The schools I visited did not even have the basic infrastructure required at a school. The books were torn, the desks and chairs were broken and there were no toilets. Furthermore, the English teacher asked us to interview her in Urdu as she could not speak proper English.

After a month of hard work, the completed documentary was allowed a public viewing in the school auditorium and was widely acclaimed by the students, teachers and the headmistress. I was particularly proud of this achievement as I had taken the initiative to be part of this documentary, carried out in-depth research about the various types of schools in Pakistan and showed other people the reality and severity of the situation. Something needs to be done to improve the education system in government schools so that children from low-income families can also have the opportunities to excel.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 28^th, 2013.