MANSEHRA: Educationists and heads of schools and colleges from across Khyber Pakhtunkhwa on Monday stressed that the government should increase the education budget and take measures to enroll out-of-school children in educational institutions for the prosperity and development of the province.
“Around five million children in our province alone are out of schools, which is highly lamnetable and needs to be addressed with sincerity and dedication,” former provincial education minister Inayatullah Khan told the concluding session of a one-day workshop organised by the Ghazi Education Foundation here.
Participants from different parts of the country attended the workshop titled ‘Education Deserves a Sense of Priority’ and discussed the need for the government to prioritise education from the primary to the higher level.
“In our society, education is often viewed merely as a source of employment. Instead, it should be regarded as a fundamental tool for building better character in individuals and making them responsible human beings who contribute to the welfare of society,” he said.
The divisional amir of Jamaat-e-Islami in Hazara, Abdul Razzaq Abbasi, said that the Al-Khidmat Foundation was spending substantial resources to provide education to orphans and underprivileged children throughout the province, and that the government should follow suit.
Another educationist, Asim Shahzad, said that schoolteachers in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa were playing a pivotal role in educating students.He said the provincial government should increase educational expenditures in the budget.“The government should allocate greater resources and a reasonable share of the gross domestic product to the education sector, with a particular focus on science and technology,” Shahzad said.
Speaking on the occasion, educationist Waqas Anjum Jaffari said that conventional wars had largely been replaced by economic competition, and success in this era would only be possible if students were equipped with education in contemporary disciplines.
