Sindh Education Minister Jam Mehtab on Wednesday while speaking on the condition of education in the province said that the provincial government was unsuccessful in achieving the goals that it had set for itself in the education sector.
“I will be honest, I could not bring about the reforms I wanted to introduce in the province’s education sector,” confessed Mehtab in an interview with a private media outlet.
However, the minister insisted that the government had managed to improve the quality of education in Sindh and has not failed entirely and added that substantial improvements in the system will take time.
He stressed upon the importance of having well educated and well-trained teachers and said that “the government is now focused on recruiting highly qualified teachers for science, mathematics, computer studies and English language to improve the quality of education in the province”.
He further said that the government will soon recruit 5,000 teachers as the current number is insufficient to fulfil province’s educational needs.
A similar picture of province’s educational sector has been portrayed by a recent report released by Alif Ailaan titled Pakistan District Education Rankings 2017.
In the list of education scores, Karachi West was the highest ranked district in the province at number 14.
Sindh ranked at number seven in the educational scores for provinces, leaving only the Federally Administered Tribal Areas behind.
According to Academy of Educational Planning and Management data, the total number of primary schools in Sindh have fallen from 44,522 in 2012-13, to 38,132 in 2016-17.