Islamabad, April 23 (IANS) Learning crisis deepens and existing gaps further widen when children in Pakistan, who struggle with basic literacy, keep on missing schools. In March, Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif announced closure of schools and a shift to online classes for all higher education institutions for two weeks to manage the increasing price of fuel caused by the conflict in West Asia. However, this is not the only time when Pakistan government decided to shut down schools.
“If one reviews the news archives, one can find reports of repeated closures of educational institutions for reasons ranging from security risks to the Covid-19 pandemic, crises driven by climate change and smog. The school closure announcement was just one instance in a recurring pattern. Despite schools having reopened, there is no guarantee that it will not happen again,” Mehrin Shah, a development practitioner, wrote in Pakistan’s leading daily Dawn.
“But what about the implications of this persistent cycle? For a country where, according to the latest report released by the Pakistan Institute of Education, 77 per cent of 10-year-olds are not able to read and comprehend a simple text, the education system is already mired in a deep learning crisis. When children who struggle with basic literacy keep on missing school, it compounds the learning crisis and further widens the existing gaps,” she added.
Schools remained shut for 97 days in Pakistan due to climate change-driven crisis in 2023-24, which makes up 54 per cent of the normal academic year. Pakistan was among the first nations in the world to shut down schools when the Covid-19 pandemic erupted. More than 26 million students dropped out of schools in Pakistan during the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic and only 50 per cent returned to schools for studying. Majority of the students who dropped out of schools in Pakistan were girls, Shah wrote in Dawn.
Apart from affecting learning outcomes, schools closures also have a gendered impact, with girls, especially in underprivileged settings, paying heavy price. For many students, schools become a safe space against child marriage and child labour. However, the closure of schools takes away that safe space, thereby increase the risk of school dropouts and child marriage.
Shah asserted that some people might argue that remote learning can serve as an alternative in such a situation. However, this method of learning cannot be accessed by all the students in Pakistan as household distractions, lack of familial support in understanding instructional content, limited understanding of the language used for classroom instructions and lack of access to the internet and modern gadgets hinder online learning.
“One of my colleagues stated that schools had instructed parents to teach topics at home and once the students returned to school, those lessons would not be covered by the teacher. One might ask, who was going to teach those children not fortunate enough to have literate family members at home? Another colleague said she and her husband were in office all day, which left their son unattended at home, where he played video games all day and did not take any interest in virtual learning,” mentioned Mehrin Shah in Dawn.
“An already strained education system should not be further tested through this shutdown practice. However, if such measures are deemed necessary and unavoidable, the education system must be seriously supported to protect student learning. An already strained education system should not be further tested through this shutdown practice,” she added.
–IANS
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