LAHORE
\nAfter visiting the Government Pilot School Wahdat Road, Lahore, Punjab Caretaker Chief Minister Mohsin Naqvi said Monday while talking to media that providing the best education to children at schools was the responsibility of the government.
\nHe stated that the government had been addressing the basic problems in government schools.
\n\u201cInstitutions like Central Model School and Pilot School were examples in the past. Efforts are underway to raise the quality of education in institutions like Pilot School,\u201d he vowed.
\n\u201cThere are 48 thousand schools in Punjab. It is not possible to fix all of them at the same time. A team has been formed to ensure improvement in government schools,\u201d he told the media.
\nThe government is also trying to establish a Centre of Excellence. Rs20 to Rs25 billion worth of funds are needed to make Lahore schools centres of excellence,\u201d he added.
\n\u201cIt may not be appropriate to spend Rs20 to Rs25 billion only on Lahore schools while ignoring the rest of the schools in Punjab. For improvement, the management and infrastructure of government schools are being given to private institutions,\u201d he further told the media.
\n\u201cA lot of improvement has been seen in government schools that were entrusted to private institutions. The government school, which had 300 students studying, now has 1,500 students after being handed over to educational NGOs,\u201d he claimed.
\n\u201cSchools are not being privatised. Teachers will be the same; funding will be the same,\u201d he declared. \u201cPilot School has bigger grounds than Aitchison College, but sports activities are zero,\u201d he stated.
\nThe caretaker chief minister also reviewed administrative affairs of the school including the appointment of a permanent principal. He also stopped the teachers from going on election duty during school hours.
\nHe also issued instructions to the Parks and Horticulture Authority (PHA) to fix the condition of the school\u2019s ground. He directed the preparation of Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) for the water filtration plant, adding: \u201cNow, no teacher will go on the election duty.\u201d
\nHe pointed out that the number of schools was going up and down as a stock exchange, adding that the quality of teachers had to be improved through monitoring. The children told the chief minister about their problems and also took autographs from him.
\nThey demanded a discount on bus fares at which the chief minister directed the education secretary to take steps to provide a concession in bus fares to students.
\nThe chief minister said that the Pilot School would be made a model school. \u201cThere were three to four model schools in Lahore. The standard of education at these model schools has fallen due to lack of attention,\u201d he added.
\nProvincial Education Minister Mansoor Qadir, Education Secretary Ahsan Waheed and others accompanied the chief minister.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
LAHORE After visiting the Government Pilot School Wahdat Road, Lahore, Punjab Caretaker Chief Minister Mohsin Naqvi said Monday while talking to media that providing the best education to children at schools was the responsibility of the government. He stated that the government had been addressing the basic problems in government schools. \u201cInstitutions like Central Model […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":355455,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-360564","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-top-news"},"yoast_head":"\n