Is the Gulf Between Government and Private Education in the Universities Widening?

In this documentary you can easily differentiate between public and private university after listening to the principals of well known institutes like FC College and Govt. Science College. It is also highlighted in this documentary that student unions are becoming one of the major drawbacks of downfall in the public sector.......

Substandard Private Universities Face Closure

JUNE was suppose to be quite decisive for private universities in the country, as Higher Education Commission (HEC) was suppose to close down those, which did not meet its minimum criteria Earlier, HEC had warned substandard private universities across the country to fulfill the minimum criteria laid down in this connection otherwise these might face closures and withdrawal of charters converting these into colleges.
For the first time in 2002, the Chancellors’ Committee meeting, chaired by President Musharraf, had set a deadline of February 28, 2007 for private degree awarding institutes to meet the criteria in five years time. In 2005, HEC published "Parent Alert" advertisements in national newspapers warning people about the substandard private universities. The move had sparked a controversy and a number of private universities had criticized HEC saying that the advertisements did not have a healthy impression on students of such institutions while these institutes were in process of improving their standards. Interestingly in 2006, the Chancellors Committee meeting decided to extend the deadline till June 30, 2008.
In 2007, the HEC had relaxed its criteria for the establishment of an institution of higher education in the private sector. Reportedly, HEC had amended the criteria following requests of provincial governments, especially of the Punjab.
In this regard, HEC Attestation & Accreditation Director General Muhammad Javed Khan said the Chancellors Committee had decided to curb the menace of mushrooming substandard universities by not granting charters to them without adequate PhD holders in its faculty. "It had been decided in principle to close down institutions or to convert these to colleges on June 30, 2008, which don’t meet the minimum criteria," he said. Replying to a question, he said almost all the private universities in Punjab had improved and met the criteria owing to which action was unlikely in Punjab in June. However, he expressed his dissatisfaction over performance of some universities in Sindh and Azad Jammu & Kashmir. He said final action regarding closure or withdrawal of charters will taken by the Chancellors Committee.
Academic circles have urged the government not to extend the deadline this time and take stern action against such private universities, which are not meeting criteria set for this purpose. They said no compromise should be made on quality and standard of education.

Is privatization of universities helpful?

From recent years privatization of the government institutes has become a major issue in the country. Actually according to me the answer to the question that why government is selling its assets is that the government is unable to run these institutes successfully. Another major reason is that government has no proper rules and regulations, no criteria and fewer resources to run it. So, more and more government institutes are privatizing. One of the most familiar examples of this is Forman Christian College Lahore. On the other hand I think the privatization of the universities has both strengths and weaknesses in a way like government universities are very easy to afford for both lower and upper class but private universities are not easy to afford. But from other prospective private universities are considered to be far better in education standard as its course material is considered equivalent to the international standard. No doubt that it is better for all the universities privatized recently to run publicly, but with meeting all the international standards. But if it is not possible for the government to do so than these universities should be privatized to give better education to the students because these students are the future of Pakistan and if they are successful than they are the one who are going to lead the country to its success.

Why Going Abroad if Not Return?

Since from 1947 when Pakistan came into being students prefer to go abroad to get higher education. So the problem here is not that why are they going abroad because getting knowledge is always good no matter from where you are getting it but the question here is that if they go abroad:

Why they do not want to return back to their country?

Why they prefer to start working their instead of their own country?

It is noticed that the higher percentage of the students going abroad are those who get their MBBS degree from medical colleges and went abroad for specialization because there is no proper medical university in Pakistan which is providing specialization facility. But the reason why Pakistani institutes are not providing this facility is that they need specialized staff for this but how can they get this staff if their own students do not want to come back to their homeland after doing their specialization. It is my request to overseas Pakistani doctors to return back to their country because there are many patients who die only because they are not getting proper treatment in Pakistan and they cannot afford to go abroad for their proper treatment.

Pakistani Universities

Government VS Private Institutes

When Pakistan was founded in 1947 as a result of the partition with India, the country had only one institution of higher education, the University of the Punjab. Over the next 20 years, many private and public schools and higher education institutions were established to help fuel the country’s socio-economic development. In the early 1970s, all of Pakistan’s educational institutions were nationalized under the government of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, who was committed to the idea of Islamic Socialism. After mid 80's private educational institutions were allowed to operate on the condition that they comply with government-recognized standards. So until 1991, there were only two recognized private universities in Pakistan Aga Khan University established in 1983; and Lahor University of Management Sciences established in 1985. But as the time passes the rapid expansion of private higher education is even more remarkable if we look at the number of institutions established on a year-by-year basis.

Actually the quality of private universities varies widely, they all share some common traits. Most of them have adopted the American model of higher education, which features a four-year bachelor's degree and system of credits. No doubt that the private sector institutes are also costly. The most expensive of the private universities is the IQRA University/Asian Management Institute, which charges an annual tuition of nearly US$2,200. However, most private sector universities are priced between US$1,000 and $1,500. In a country where the average per capita income is estimated to be US$277 per year, this puts private institutions beyond the reach of most Pakistanis.

Supporters of private higher education believe that non-government institutions can deliver higher quality education and do it far more efficiently than the public sector. They point to the fact that private institutes rarely suffer the closures and class suspensions their public counterparts do, and that students enrolled at these institutes are more appropriate to complete their degree programs on time. They also believe that private universities will introduce international standards of competence and accountability.

On the other hand, detractors fear that the proliferation of private institutes will lead to the commercialization of higher education and a two-tiered system based on wealth.

Contrary to this the quality of education in the government institutes is a serious problem. In the majority of the cases, these are crowded with students and most of the time without adequate number of teaching staff. The standards set for the employment of teaching staff are not properly observed in the presence of a low literacy in the country. The pay scales offered to the teaching staff are also not very attractive. On top of this, there are no monetary or non-monetary incentives for teachers to improve their qualification. Therefore teachers show little or no interest in their job. There is no system to monitor the performance of these schools and therefore dropout rates are very high. These schools follow an outdated syllabus, which has no match with the current needs of the labor market.

IS EDUCATION IN THE UNIVERSITIES GIVING EMPLOYMENT

In the past few years economic reforms may have given a boost to industrial productivity and brought in foreign investment in capital intensive areas. But the boom has not created jobs. This was not unexpected. Today, we are more concerned for our career and our successors, as a result from past few years our literacy rate is increasing. But I feel, ‘is there any need for us to get literate, to gain knowledge?’ I mean we are psychologically improved but what about our other spheres of development. Gaining knowledge will not completely boost us and our career. We do have need for material.
The day to-day increase in unemployment is creating a sort of fear in my mind, especially in recent months. Individuals doing bachelor or equivalent, sitting at home and writing articles like me, to be very frank, are the real patriots and has still same feelings as, ‘kya hoga is country ka?’
In recent years, government universities have launched various professional courses and students are much more attracted towards these instead of ‘puraane wale’ degree courses. Even my parents feel that I am wasting my 4 years in doing BBA. Its only me who knows what I am getting in wasting my years. And my best achievement is, today I’m writing article to make you people aware of what problems our generation is facing.
Because of political instability we have noticed much higher rate of unemployment in Pakistan. Investors are running from our country not only because of too much bomb blasting but because we have no incentive for the new investors to come in and invest in our country. Well established Companies want experience but what about us, the freshers? If the companies will not employ us, from where will we get experience? We all know that working in call center does not have a long term prospects but still we are running towards it (we look to it as an easy way of earning).
And today, even the youngsters who have done professional courses are not getting their equivalent jobs. What is this? Why are we spending lakhs of rupees in education that will give us nothing? Even though government is subsidizing our education, why are we running towards private notes?

I think that instead of giving lots of money to private institutions, its better sitting at home, reading newspaper and writing articles so that I may earn little concern by the readers and you may understand that it’s not only me who is going through this situation, rather millions are there who are suffering from this situation.