KARACHI – The Sindh Technical Education and Vocational Training Authority (STEVTA), which was established by the present government, lacks funds to improve its Technical, Education and Vocational Training (TEVT) system.
Moreover, STEVTA officials recently approached the World Bank (WB) and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) for financial assistance to successfully manage the authority’s affairs and ensure its effective working, well-placed sources in the Sindh government revealed.
On April 24, 2009, STEVTA took administrative control of all the technical, educational and vocational training institutions, including 82 of the education department, 35 of the social welfare department and 34 of the labour department.
Prior to the merger, all three departments were performing overlapping functions, especially in the area of vocational training; and the infrastructure of these institutions in terms of building equipment and machinery, and teaching faculty did not meet the national or international standards.
Resultantly, the trained manpower produced by these institutions was accepted in neither local nor international labour market due to proficiency gaps. After the formation of STEVTA, a baseline survey of TEVT institutions was carried out to ascertain the factual state of affairs of the institutions in terms of structure, equipment, human resources, enrolment and pass percentages.
The institutions are running under the capacity with 50 percent enrolment and some of them are non-functional. The condition of the buildings of the institutions is poor, there is acute shortage of teachers, and the institutions are functioning with 50 percent staff. The Sindh government has extended complete autonomy to STEVTA to ensure effective policy framework for visible improvements in TEVT institutions.
The government has allowed sufficient financial resources under development and non-development budget through Special Drawing Account. The authority would revamp selected institutions and provide them with the required equipment, manpower and management to transform them into centres of excellence.
Under this programme, at least one institution would be upgraded in each district. Besides that, public-private partnership might be initiated to transform production units and workshops in selected institutions into teaching factories where trainees could get hands-on experience under reputed industrial partners at the premises.
Partnering with renowned local universities for co-branding of professional certificate programme is also on the cards.
