Maths and science competition was held among seven government schools across Rawalpindi aimed at improving the quality of learning in math and science education among students.
The event was jointly organised by Rawalpindi Education Authority (REA), Pakistan Alliance for Math and Science and Alif Ailaan on Saturday.
During the competition, four girls and three boys’ schools were initially selected to hold the intra-school science and math competition. Later on, top three contestants from each school competed in an inter-school math and science competition held at Government Comprehensive Girls’ Higher Secondary School, Dhoke Kashmirian.
Students from Government Comprehensive Girls’ Higher Secondary School secured first position, Government Girls’ High School, Bagh Sardaran, came second and Government Christian High School Raja Bazaar and Government Boys High School Islamia No 4 Liaquat Road shared the trophy for the third position in the competition.
The event was jointly presided by Punjab Education Foundation Chairman Engineer Qamar-Ul- Islam Raja and Senator Ms Najma Hameed.
Speaking on the occasion, Qamar said that the Punjab government was quite serious about improving the quality of education in the government schools and Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif was taking special interest in the matter. He said that science was the future of the nation and it was high time to excel in science and technology. Raja further elaborated that current government has increased the educational budget from Rs 63 billion to Rs 350 billion.
District Education Officer (Secondary Education) Dr Tariq Qazi said that one boys and one girl’s school for a tehsil will be designated as transformation center for maths and science. The transformation center would help improve the quality of math and science education in all the other public schools of the respective tehsil.
Mohsin Naseem, Alif Ailaan’s Regional Campaign Organizer, stressed the need for more budget allocation to improve the quality of math and science education.
He said that out of 425 government schools in Rawalpindi district, only 165 have science labs as compared to 374 IT labs. Whereas, Punjab Education Commission (PEC) results show that Class 8th scored an average of 45pc in science subject placing the district at number 32 and averaged 42pc in math which placed District Rawalpindi at number 31 out of 36 districts of the Punjab.
Senator Najma Hameed showed immense interest in the science models prepared by students and handed over the shields among the position holders and congratulated the organizers of the event. District Education Authority is planning to hold science and math competitions on regular basis.
