Short Essay: The Sorry State of Education
Education has been, for so long, the only consolation that the middle class had. From middle class I do not mean the actual middle class but those proletarians aka lower-middle-class that assume themselves slightly better than what they actually are. The founders of this class are the fathers (and few mothers) of the generation that has now crossed the mark of 45 and that managed, in their youth, to get “some” education – matric with/out supply, in/complete intermediate, and, if lucky, a private BA. They could see the boons and benefits of education: from their families of meagre resources they managed to raise self-sustaining families, rising to an enviable status that meant nothing to the world but world to them. They directed their efforts and invested their money in educating their children.
It was this lot that watched those who studied a little more and a little longer for competitive exams making their mark, with little unscrupulous means, by leaps and bounds. Even those who aimed at the most respected professions, i.e., engineering and medicine, sought refuge in federal and provincial competitive exams. The secret to “real”, i.e., resourceful, success lied in competitive exams, and the struggling class learnt it by heart so that the knowledge can be transferred from their heart to their children’s: education their only hope; children their last chance.
Primary education was easy as it was the same for everyone. Matric was not difficult either as science was the key to success. The results, however, gave parents some tough time, but they somehow managed to keep their children in sciences, i.e., pre-medial, pre-engineering or even general sciences. The toughest call happened to be bachelors: nobody knew what to do when their child could not make it to an engineering university or medicine school; they asked around about the subject that could bear some promise and made a “prudent” choice on which the future of their child would be laid.
University ended; degrees received, but the now-graduate-child knew not how and where to get employed. A surge for references began along with the never-ending process of applying for every upcoming government job, literally “every”. Feeble knocking never got any door opened, and the queues got longer and longer. With every new badge adding to the previously unemployed lot, the waiting line got a little longer and the chances of getting employed dimmer.
Each one of the un/employed degree holder knew that, at least for once, s/he had to try her/his luck in CSS exams, as if combat is won by chance. Those who saw nothing but the competitive exam as their final goal consoled themselves with the possibility of clearing the exam in next chance, ending up in exhausting their all three lifelines. Besides, there was always the choice of casually applying for the less-sought-after jobs that other government departments announce from time to time.
Since everyone has to do something, what could be better than a state-paid, lifelong extravaganza, i.e., government job! So the defeated ones that were in thousands started applying for other jobs, and their high aims boiled down from being as high as bureaucracy to as low as pedagogy. Pedagogues, though verbally shown great respect to, are the last resort for the dignified youth (nobody dreams of becoming a teacher!), due to their low-profile and low-self-esteem which obviously alludes to inadequate budget allocated to education and to insufficient social status attached with their profession (nobody hopes of marrying his daughter to a teacher!).
Besides, some professions particularly teachers, nurses and house-servants are gendered in this part of the world; people do not expect men to fall down to these careers, and those who do are accepted but with reservations.
What parents were expecting is one, and what happened to their children is a different story. The job market became over-saturated with job applicants; a hundred thousand for a thousand vacancies! Here is the data of job applicants for posts in Punjab Higher Education Department, advertised on 06/18/2017. The second- and fourth-level posts (Assistant Professor and Professor) received reasonable response, but the entry level posts (Lecturer)made some shocking revelations.
Arts and Humanities topped the list of job-seekers: Area of study English – BS-20 Professor: (male) posts 5 and applicants 2; (female) posts 3 and applicants 0, BS-18 Assistant Professor: (male) posts 42 and applicants 806; (female) posts 50 and applicants 956, BS-17 Lecturer: (male) posts 80 and applicants 6,676; (female) posts 105 and applicants 16,615.
Area of study Urdu – BS-20 Professor: (male) posts 1 and applicants 8; (female) posts 1 and applicants 5, BS-18 Assistant Professor: (male) posts 15 and applicants 561; (female) posts 15 and applicants 560, BS-17 Lecturer: (male) posts 28 and applicants 5,902; (female) posts 35 and applicants 11,454. Area of study Islamiat –BS-20 Professor: (male) posts 1 and applicants 6; (female) posts 1 and applicants 2, BS-18 Assistant Professor: (male) posts 15 and applicants 592, (female) posts 15 and applicants 513, BS-17 Lecturer: (male) posts 28 and applicants 6,199; (female) posts 35 and applicants 11,213.
In the world of technology, most of the students are still falling for the clichéd literature (of English/Urdu and of religious), making it a known fact that, in Pakistan, not-so-promising students go for less-competitive, lower-merit subjects like Islamiat, Urdu and English. Nevertheless, Sciences, which have always topped the merit-lists, no more promise any prosperity either.
The sorry-figure that Sciences cut is heart-breaking: Area of study Biology – BS-20 Professor: (male) posts 3 and applicants 11; (female) posts 2 and applicants 5, BS-18 Assistant Professor: (male) posts 23 and applicants 456; (female) posts 22 and applicants 565, BS-17 Lecturer: (male) posts 45 and applicants 4,171; (female) posts 50 and applicants 10,453. (All these applicants were once aspiring to be doctors!). Area of study Computer Sciences – BS-20 Professor: no posts for men; (female) posts 2 and applicants 0, BS-18 Assistant Professor: (male) posts 33 and applicants 806; (female) posts 41 and applicants 324, BS-17 Lecturer: (male) posts 65 and applicants 12,922; (female) posts 95 and applicants 9,358. (These are those unfortunates who failed to get admission in the “pres” – pre-medical and pre-engineering.)
English, Urdu, Islamiat, Biology and Computer Sciences have been those five fields in which the number of applicants for the post of lecturer crossed 10,000. (The unemployment of CS graduates in Global Village is ironic.) Unfortunately, the highest number of those degree holders who have yet to start a career remained highest in English, i.e., total male and female applicants 23,291 for 185 posts, and in Computer Sciences, i.e., total male and female applicants 22,280 for 160 posts. Moreover, Fields like Mathematics, Physics, Education and Commerce witnessed more than 10,000 applicants for less than 200 vacancies.
Setting aside the subject matter, have a look at the complete picture. Overall, 89,793 male (for 820 posts) and 135,994 female (for 1,048 posts) applicants, i.e., 234,787, which is two lac thirty-four thousand seven hundred and eighty seven (Alas! I can’t write only here), applied for 1,868 BS-17 entry level teaching posts. And, this is just one province, i.e., Punjab. (Obviously, the number of female teaching applicants is far greater than those men who aspire to be a teacher!) Less than 2,000 would get allocated to areas across the province, leaving behind some 233,000 licking their wounds and cursing the system knowing not what actually bewilders them.
Due to lack of research, it is not possible to find out the exact number of jobless graduates across Pakistan, and those who are on job but under-paid; however, this number is enough to imagine bleak future of youth, and broken hopes of their families,in Pakistan.
The concern is not only the unemployed youth but also the frustration that thousands of them are bound to suffer as obviously only few would make it
Last year, the hue and cry made on the numbers of FPSC CSS applicants, i.e., 12,176 (out of 20,717 applicants) who appeared in the FPSC competitive exam but only 369 qualified for VIVA and only 238 made it to the services, would not have happened if someone has analysed the cumbersome statistics coming from other departments. (Of course, each year only some 200 would make it to the academy, leaving the rest to speculate for the rest of their lives how they might have thrived if only they have qualified, dreaming how one day their prodigy would secure a seat in the bureaucracy for them!)
The problem does not end here as the trouble awaits in terms of hundreds of those who are currently enrolled in degree programs across the province, and would be out soon to search a job, to stretch the rope of applications further and to raise the bar of competition higher. Also, with the number of degrees the quality of education has only abated.
The concern is not only the unemployed youth but also the frustration that thousands of them are bound to suffer as obviously only few would make it. The in-search-of-job youth that served as the last hope of their middle class family’s prosperity is abashed; it is not just the graduate who suffers but the whole clan that hoped for the ending of a hand-to-mouth life for 21 years. It is not the parents who are to be blamed for making wrong choices or breeding less-intelligent children but the country that does not know how to utilise its human resource. Pakistan, if cannot change the lot of its youth, must stop giving them false hopes, and should stop taking pride in being the country of flourishing youth.
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