Education policy on right path: Atta
By Ali Imran

RAWALPINDI—It is need of the time that the colleges and universities of Pakistan should be strengthened. For the purpose skillful knowledge is the only driving force to go forward. This was stated by Prof. Dr. Atta-ur-Rahman, FRS, Federal Minister, Chairman Higher Education Commission and Adviser to the Prime Minister for Science and Technology while addressing inaugural ceremony of “Second International Symposium on Issues in Higher Education in Pakistan-Undergraduate Degree: The weakest Link” started here today at Arid Agriculture University, Rawalpindi. He said that college education does not come under the umbrella of Higher Education Commission directly as it is the matter of provincial governments. However much is being done to strengthen college education through faculty training, scholarships and research studies etc.
He further said that collapse of higher education during last four decades has drastically affected university and college education both, where our more talented youth was being spoiled because of ineffective policies and programmes. Knowledge is the only way forward for us, he said, to unleash the potential of our youth and invest in knowledge in order to become a developed country. He said that knowledge has now become the main driving force of world economies and it was imperative for Pakistan to adopt this strategy.
With an increase in the budget of higher education during the last four years, the future represented an age of opportunity for the youth of Pakistan. At present a mere 3.7% of youth aged 17-23 have access to higher education as compaired to 68% in Korea of the same age group. HEC was endeavouring to double the figure over the next five years, with maximum stress on quality as there could be nothing worse than poor quality graduates, he added. To address the issue of quality, the faculty is being emphsises by training our brightest students at Ph.D level in top universities abroad. The previous low quality of teaching and research with lack of relevance to national needs is being addressed in the new programmes.
He outlined HEC’s action plan for faculty development with stress on quality through massive scholarships in the best foreign universities. Scholarships for doctoral programmes were also in place. The latest scholarship project to be approved was for Rs. 15 billion which would benefit students of Pakistan. Arrangements have also being made to provide free access to academic literature, sophisticated instrumentation and technically assisted learning. HEC was offering focused support to the key areas of linkages of research to industry. He stated that major emphasis was being placed on basic sciences, applied sciences, social sciences, economics, finance, management and linkages to the industry.
He mentioned the remarkable change in salary structure for university teachers under the Tenure Track System, which has so far been adopted by 35 universities, as well as the research productivity allowance based on cumulative impact factors during the preceding years. The successful Foreign Faculty Hiring Programme to reverse brain drain had attracted 270 eminent professors from abroad and placed at universities all over Pakistan. Prof. Atta ended his speech by saying that we should all come forward to solve the major problems of college education which are access, quality and relevance to national needs and to equip our youth with latest modern skills because the nations are built by minds specifically.
Earlier Dr. Khalid Mahmood Khan, Vice-Chancellor UAAR and Prof. Khalid Iqbal, President PEP Foundation welcomed Prof. Atta and the dignitaries for attending the symposium and lauded the efforts of HEC for strengthening higher education sector in Pakistan through its recent initiatives. The participants of the seminar include the eminent educationists and senior academicians from USA, UK, Nervy and Pakistan.
He also stressed the need for utilizing modern technology for education to take maximum benefit of it and added that HEC established digital library program through which the students of Pakistan have access to 20,000 international journals and 4,000 electronic text books. Besides, video conferencing network has also been set up to facilitate the students to have direct interaction with reputed researcher and professors of the world. HEC has objective to promote high quality research-based education and it has been working for this for last several years, the chairman added. He said, 500-1000 students are being sent abroad annually for higher education and added that output of our Indigenous Ph. D programme has raised up to 1500. He said, HEC has been working to establish new engineering universities with the help of foreign countries to produce quality output and added headquarter of such universities would be established in the federal capital very soon.