LAHORE: In their maiden meeting with Punjab Minister for School Education Dr Murad Raas on Wednesday, the chief executive officers (CEOs) of Lahore division’s district education authorities (DEAs) highlighted problems, including financial issues, and missing facilities in schools.

The minister had issued a schedule for the meetings of CEOs -- Aug 29 (Lahore), Aug 30 (Faisalabad and Sargodha), Aug 31 (Gujranwala), Sept 3 (Multan and Bahawalpur), and Sept 4 (Dera Ghazi Khan, Rawalpindi and Sahiwal).

The first meeting of chief executive officers of Lahore division was held at the committee room of Minister’s Block. Secretary (schools education) Ambreen Raza, Special Secretary Nadeemur Rehman, director (monitoring) and CEOs of district education authorities of Lahore division were present.

The CEOs had given presentation about the ongoing projects to the minister.

Lahore DEA CEOs talk of withheld funds, missing facilities

Talking to Dawn on condition of anonymity, one of the participants in the meeting said the CEOs told the minister that they were not getting the budget approved by the assembly and Planning and Development department was not releasing funds. They also highlighted the missing facilities in schools in Kasur and Lahore especially non-availability of drinking water.

He said the respective CEO told the meeting that most of the schools in Kasur did not have drinking water facility and no filtration plants were installed there.

The CEOs said there were several dangerous buildings in Lahore, Kasur and other areas and they also needed additional class rooms to accommodate students.

Mr Raas said reforms would be introduced holistically in the school education department to secure the future of the youth by providing them with quality education.

He said the government would construct additional classrooms in public sector schools. He said the CEOs should submit reports about problems of their respective districts and they would be timely solved.

The meeting took a detailed review of different issues including dilapidated school buildings, missing facilities, need for construction of additional classrooms to accommodate the rising number of students, grant of additional funds and capacity building of teachers along with new recruitment.

The minister announced that he would hold public courts at district level to resolve the issues and public complaints would be solved expeditiously.

He said special attention would be given to provision of missing facilities in schools because the goal of quality education could not be achieved without provision of conducive atmosphere to students.

He directed recruitment of sweepers and security guards in schools. He also issued directions for the assessment of performance and educational qualification of teachers.

The minister said people voted the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf for bringing about a change in the [archaic] system. “We are committed to bring about a meaningful change in every sphere of life so that Pakistan could rapidly move towards progress and prosperity,” he said.

Earlier, the secretary (schools) also gave a detailed briefing to the minister about ongoing schemes of the department.

Published in Dawn, August 30th, 2018