JAVED and Hamid were neighbours and grew up together. They
were the same age; their fathers — one an engineer, the other an
administrative assistant — worked for the same government department.
Both started school in the early 1970s. Javed’s parents decided to send
him to an English-medium missionary school while Hamid was sent to a
public-sector school.
The quality of education at
Javed’s school, at a cost that was only slightly higher, was much
better. Javed did his O-level and then was lucky enough to get a
scholarship to study abroad. He is now one of the leading bankers in the
country. Hamid did well in his matriculation and FSc examinations,
studied engineering and is now working as a senior manager in a
multinational company. Both have done well and moved up the
socioeconomic ladder.
This shows that quality education
for their children was within the grasp of middle-income parents, and
with some hard work and luck, it could provide social and economic
mobility. This is one of the basic goals of making education available
to all and with some notion of merit. Though education was not available
to all children, the cost in absolute terms of even high-quality
education was not too steep. The difference in cost and quality of
education between various educational providers was not very large.
The
last three decades have altogether changed the educational landscape in
Pakistan. Tuition and other fees of top schools have increased
substantially. Some of the top schools now charge each student more than
Rs35,000 as tuition fee per month. They have significant other charges
as well. Even the lower end of elite schools are now charging around
Rs15,000 per child per month as tuition fee. If a family has two to
three children, they are looking at a minimum of Rs100,000 for enrolment
in the lower tier elite schools (the cost includes tuitions and other
fees, books, transport, sports). Expenses for the top elite schools
would be at least two to three times as much.
An elite English-medium school student does not have much in common with a madressah-going child.
Getting children after-school coaching, usually referred to
as tuition, is also very common amongst urban families. These, at the
higher end, cost another Rs8,000-odd per child every month. Having
children and getting them educated at good private schools is an
expensive proposition.
Government schools are ‘free’ in
the sense that they do not charge tuition fee formally. And some
provincial governments also provide school books. But the cost of
transportation and other expenses are still incurred by the parents. The
cost each month per child in this case should not be more than Rs4,000
or so. Low- and middle-fee private schools charge anywhere between a few
hundred to a few thousand rupees every month.
The poor
and even middle-income groups cannot afford to send their children to
moderate- and high-fee private schools. Access to schooling, thus, is
not based on merit. Schools that charge high fees in general also offer
better standards. The quality of studies at government and low-fee
private schools is overall quite poor.
Access
differentials, based on wealth and not merit, create subsequent social
and economic differences and these become more entrenched generation
after generation. Rich people’s children, talented or not, are well
supported by their parents, go to good schools, get a sound education
and training and are able to get a decent job or a good break in
business. Children born to a poor household go to poor-quality schools,
do not pick up the ‘right’ accent or receive the right education, and
end up, even if they are talented and complete their education, with a
relatively poor job and have discouraging career prospects. More likely,
the poor person’s child will drop out of school and never finish his or
her schooling.
To all this add the differences in access
to schools and schooling quality based on medium of instruction,
curriculum and textbooks, rural-urban differences, provincial
differences, gender, disability and marginalisation, and you have a
picture of an extremely undulating educational landscape.
We
are seeing results from a landscape that reflects increasing
inequality, lack of socioeconomic mobility for the poor and even
middle-income groups and increasing fragmentation of the polity in
Pakistan. A child who goes to an elite English-medium school does not
have anything in common, in terms of experience, worldview, and even
exposure, with a child who goes to a madressah, or with one who goes to a
government or low-fee private school.
The child from the
elite school follows a different curriculum, has different books, talks
a different language, refers to a different culture when looking for a
reference, appears for different examinations (O- or A-levels, American
high school or IB) and looks to a different world for access to higher
education and even jobs.
How can all these children be
citizens of the same country? How can they share the same vision for
their future and for the future of their country? How can they talk to
each other, empathise with each other and understand each other’s points
of view? How can they think that what happened to them was fair and not
blame the other for what happened to them? They cannot. And given the
system, they should not as well. We are, by design, creating solitudes.
One
of the purposes of education is to provide an opportunity for
socioeconomic mobility. It is supposed to level the playing field for
the haves and the have-nots. Another purpose is to develop a common
experience for everyone to create effective citizenship. Our education
system is miserably failing on both these counts. Merit has little to do
with access to quality education. And a very divided and differentiated
system is producing children who do not even know the world in which
the other children live. And we expect a common future?
The
writer is a senior research fellow at the Institute of Development and
Economic Alternatives and an associate professor of economics at Lums,
Lahore.
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