The latest official report from Pakistan’s Planning Commission has revealed a concerning state of the country’s education system. The District Education Performance Index Report 2023 showed that all 134 districts in Pakistan, except for the capital Islamabad, are lagging behind on critical education indicators. These range from poor learning outcomes for students to inadequate public financing for education. The report highlighted that a human resource crisis in Pakistan, where many young people are entering the job market with little to no education. This crisis is seen as even more severe than the economic challenges the country faces. The report found some regional disparities in education performance. Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province outperformed Punjab in terms of education governance and management. However, Punjab was ahead in building education infrastructure. These differing priorities reflect the focus areas of the political parties in power - the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and the Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N).

The District Education Performance Index Report 2023 was launched jointly by the United Kingdom High Commissioner to Pakistan, Jane Marriott, and Pakistan’s Planning Minister Ahsan Iqbal. The report painted a bleak picture of Pakistan’s education system, with the entire country’s map appearing “red” in terms of poor learning outcomes and inadequate public financing for education. None of Pakistan’s 134 districts were found to be high-performing in education. All districts, except Islamabad, were categorized as either “medium” or “low” performers, signifying significant gaps and struggles in their education delivery systems. The key issues identified include poor governance, extremely poor learning outcomes for students, and insufficient budget allocation for education. The average score of 53.46 across all districts indicates a severely dysfunctional education system that requires urgent attention and interventions to address the fundamental gaps.

The “medium” scoring districts in the report are facing significant gaps in their education systems, leading to compromised outputs. These districts require serious attention and interventions to improve their education service delivery. The report also revealed that a staggering 80% of out-of-school children in Pakistan have never even enrolled in school. Additionally, parents have a strong perception of poor quality in the public education system. According to Rafiullah Kakar, a member of the Planning Commission’s Social Sector, the “learning domain index” paints a very dire picture, with the entire country appearing “red” on this indicator. He highlighted that the share of education budgets in provincial development budgets is highly inadequate, with up to 90% of current education budgets going towards paying salaries rather than improving learning outcomes. The national average score in the District Education Performance Index is 53.46, placing Pakistan firmly in the “low performance” category for its education system.

The assessment was based on five key indicators, with “infrastructure and access” scoring the highest at 58.95, suggesting some progress has been made in expanding educational opportunities, although significant gaps remain. According to the report, the second-highest scoring domain after infrastructure and access is “Inclusion (Equity & Technology)”. This suggests some progress has been made in expanding educational opportunities and access, particularly through the use of technology. However, the lowest scoring domain is “Public Financing”, highlighting the critical need for increased and better-targeted government spending in the education sector. This aligns with the earlier finding that up to 90% of current education budgets are consumed by salaries rather than improving learning outcomes. The “Learning” domain also scored poorly, reflecting the persistent challenge of low learning outcomes among students across Pakistan. Similarly, the “Governance & Management” domain, though slightly better than learning, still falls in the low category, mainly due to teacher shortages and high bureaucratic turnover.

The report identified the country’s weakest areas as internet connectivity, numeracy and reading skills, tenure of education secretaries, the share of education budget in development budgets, and the availability of schools and allied facilities. It was found that the better performance on the metric of matriculation passing rates did not accurately reflect the ground realities. For instance, the lowest-performing Kachhi district had better matric pass rates than the top-performing district in Balochistan, highlighting the need for more nuanced and comprehensive assessments. According to Rafiullah Kakar, a member of the Planning Commission’s Social Sector, the district-level assessments have become redundant, and there is a need to map education sector performance based on political constituencies. This would help hold legislators more accountable for the state of education in their respective areas.

The report found that none of the 134 districts in Pakistan fall within the “very high performance” category for education. The only exception is Islamabad, which is classified as the sole “high-performing” district, making it an outlier in the country. A majority of the districts, 56 in total, fall into the “medium” category, with Punjab leading with 32 such districts, followed by Khyber Pakhtunkhwa with 16, and Sindh with 8. Alarmingly, more than half of Pakistan’s districts, 77 in total, fall into the “low performance” category. These low-performing districts are predominantly located in Balochistan and Sindh, with 33 and 22 districts respectively. This highlights the substantial inter-provincial disparities, with all districts in Balochistan falling into the low education performance category, indicating severe challenges across the province.

Credit: Independent News Pakistan