UPE SIALKOT PROJECT

(UNIVERSAL PRIMARY EDUCATION)

 Background

 Pakistan is reported to have an average gross enrollment rate of 70% in primary schooling.  In addition to the fact that 30 % of the children never enroll, more than 50% of the enrolled children drop out from before completing the first three years of school.

Sialkot is slightly different in terms of enrollment, where the gross enrollment rate is estimated to be around 83%.  While studies for measuring dropout rates are yet to be undertaken, according to various estimates, the dropout percentile lies within the range of 50% and 60%.  In addition, 38% children dropout in the first three years of schooling, while the maximum dropout is in the first year that is around 15%.  Aggravating this situation is the issue of deteriorating quality education.  There seems to be mass consensus on the fact that the quality of education is deteriorating rapidly.  Many parents, themselves illiterate, point out that even after receiving 10 years of education their children cannot even spell their names properly. 

However exaggerated, the mass persistence of such claims, clearly reflects that parents are cognizant of and concerned about the degenerating standard of education 

Key Stakeholders

The situation analysis makes one thing crystal clear: parents, children and teachers are the primary stakeholders, and any strategy that attempts to address enrollment, dropout or quality education issues must incorporate effective participation and impart due ownership of the process to these stake holders.

 UPE Project

 Pakistan is signatory to the Convention on Rights of the Child. Educations being one of the most important rights of children, we as a nation, apart from moral obligation, are bound to provide ample educational facilities for our children. Government of Panjab took lead in this respect and enacted a law in 1994 for compulsory primary education. But the situation did not change. The law could not be enforced. Determined to proceed forward, the government decided to universalize primary education. As a first step three districts were selected to pretest a suitable model to be subsequently replicated in the whole of the province. UNICEF supported the project.

UNICEF had been in Sialkot since 1998 in connection with awareness raising and rehabilitation work for a project on elimination of child labor from soccer ball industry. So Sialkot became the arena for developing a model for primary education.

 Objectives

 To address the enrollment gap, mass dropout and deteriorating education standards, UNICEF Sialkot set  the following objectives:

1.        Enrollment of all children between 5 and 7 years of age

2.        Retention of the enrolled children for the primary schooling period

3.        Achievement of a minimum acceptable level of learning at the end of five years of schooling.

 Action Research

 UNICEF Sialkot set out to conduct action research to develop a strategy to meet these objectives.   Through trail and error, at 38 (mainly rural) locations the action research revealed that the main strategy should focus on:

 1.        Social mobilization of the parents in particular and the community in general.

2.        Motivation and capacity of teachers.

 To mobilize the parents and community to ensure their effective participation, and impart due ownership in the process, it was felt that they have to be involved at every stage; from problem identification, developing strategies and action plans, carrying it implementation, right through to monitoring the entire operation.

 The Social Mobilization process

 The following steps have been identified to facilitate meaningful participation of the parents and the community:

 a)       Reconnaissance survey

b)       Meeting with teachers

c)       Meeting with influentials

d)       Broad –based community meeting

e)       Data collection on out-of-school children by village volunteers. 

f)        Data analysis and presentation of findings to the community.

g)       Developing a village education plan focusing on bringing children to school, teacher requirement, and school infrastructure improvement, support to vulnerable families.

h)       Identification of volunteers for bringing out of school children to school.

i)         Enrollment of out of school children by the teachers and village volunteers.

j)         Monthly teachers meeting at the Union Council Level to develop learning landmarks and joyful teaching and learning techniques.

k)       Monthly meetings between the teachers and the community to monitor the progress of the children in terms of achieving improved education quality.

l)         Formation of home work groups to help children at the homes in doing their home works.

 Motivation and capacity building of teachers

 Although the community plays a key role in monitoring the quality of education through the above process, the sole stakeholders  responsible for the rise or fall of education standards in the teachers

In order to capacitate the teacher to fulfill their responsibilities  and to motivate them to do so. Comprehensive coverage of all the teacher in the project area during the project period is planned in terms of extensive structured and unstructured training that shell cover.

 A)      Motivating teachers through

Facilitating them in regaining their respect in Society .

Supporting them in solving their problem by bridging the gap between them and the education department   

B)  Enhancing their capacity in terms of

 Arriving at a better understanding of the objectives of the syllabus and developing learning land marks

Enabling them to impart learning through joyful techniques. 

 It is expected that these activities will increase enrolment, reduce dropouts, and also facilitate in imparting meaningful education,  besides ensuring sustainability of the operations set in motion through the process of the social mobilization.

 Joining hands in the UPE Movement

 The UPE Sialkot project is unique in terms of the envisaged partnership.  All the departments in puiblic sector and private sector agencies have joined hands to achieve the objectives of UPE. 

 The following public sector departments are mobilized to effect and integrated education development plan to achieve UPE objectives:

 a)       Education Department

 §         The department provides support in terms of

§         Capacity building of teachers, including logistical support in transfers to facilitate teacher convenience, and ensuring teacher student ratio at 1 : 35 

§         Preparing infrastructure improvement PC- 1s on the basis of feedback from the community

§         Effecting infrastructure improvement through the ADP

§         Ensuring teacher participation in the social mobilization process

§         Monitoring and feedback on enrollment, dropouts and infrastructure  improvement

§         Preparing quarterly progress reports on the project

§         Supporting the teachers in terms of developing learning landmarks and joyful teaching methods

 b)       Social Welfare Department

  The department provides support in the monitoring the UPE process.

c)       Revenue Department

The department provides support in identifying influentials/ opinion makers; and monitoring enrollment and dropouts at the village. 

Special Education Department

 The department will provides support in terms of direct interventions for special children as well as the development of a strategy for special children to be integrated for special children to be integrated into the UPE project.

d)       Health Department

 The department provides medical check-up facility to students on a bi-annual basis, and provided family planning services to the communities.

e)       Forestry Department

The department undertakes afforestation campaigns in collaboration with the community and school children. 

f)        Irrigation Department

The department will facilitate the community in flood management planning and better irrigation management techniques.

g)       Agriculture Department

The department will facilitate the community in increasing productivity and reducing losses.

h)       Information Department

The department will support the project in information dessemination.

 The private sector, comprising manufacturers, has pledged its support for UPE by adopting children, schools, villages, and Union Council, and have offered to take the responsibility to monitor UPE and provide support to children, parents and the teachers community.

Project Steering Committees

 The project is being managed by a District Steering Committee headed by D.C. Sialkot, and comprising the following :

D.C., ADC. *A.C., *Mayor Municipal Corporation  * Chairman District Council  * President SCCI *PC UNICEF *DHO  *XEN Pasrur link  * Deputy Director Agriculture  * DEOs  * Assistant Director Social Welfare * Assistant Director LG & RD  * Assistant Director Labour  * DIO  * Team Leader NRSP  * CEO Hilbro pvt ltd.  * Member Education Committee SCCI /Capital Sports  * Social Worker  * Member Khateeb Jamia-Al-Azhar

At the Tehsil level the project is being supervised by the respective Tehsil Steering Committees, facilitated by the respective Assistant Commissioners of the Tehsil.

Project Implementation & Administration

Sialkot has 7 Marakaz, which have been allocated to different NGOs for project implementation.  The structure of the NGOs for the project is the following:

Project Coordinator (PC):  The PCs are responsible for coordination of social mobilization, and capacity building & motivation of teachers at the Markez level.

Monitoring Extender (ME): the MEs are responsible for social mobilization, and capacity building & motivation of teachers at the grassroots level.  One ME will be responsible for 40 villages.  Once enrollment achieved, the ME will be responsible for interacting with two villages per day bon a monthly basis to monitor the progress of UPE.

Project Coverage

 The project envisages completion of the applicable UPE components for Sialkot Tehsil in the year 1999-2000.  Daska and Pasrur Tehsil will be taken will be taken up in the year 2000-2001.  Monitoring of the students and continuous capacity building of the community and teachers will be followed through the years 2001 to 2003.   

 UPE & SAHE Sialkot

Registered in 1992 under the social welfare act of 1961, SAHE Sialkot is a public interest and civil society organization. It is a non-profitable, non-governmental and non- political organization. SAHE Sialkot is one of the oldest civil society organizations in Sialkot and played a pioneering role in the civil society organization movement in the district. It was the first organization in Sialkot District that not only believed on the participatory methodology but also adopted this methodology in its working.

 Founders of the Society were inspired from SAHE Lahore, and they envisioned to improve the quality and meaningfulness of education, which is seen as a basic need for sustainability of all development efforts, and make to it available to the unprivileged and under privileged.  SAHE has worked constantly to create awareness among communities by involving them in the efforts to provide quality education. It has tried to establish links between community and education process through various means.

SAHE Sialkot established first teachers resource center in Sialkot District, with a potential for outreach at the tehsil and village level.  It has been arranging training workshops for teachers and community workers, especially those working in the field of education to ensure community awareness and participation.  Strategy of SAHE Sialkot includes collaboration with other local, national and international organizations to achieve its goals.  This ensures the contribution to the development of sustainable networks and structures.          

SAHE charter is based on the needs of an educated and enlightened youth, aware of its roots, and conscious of its potential.  Thereby, helping produce a cadre that could define the ideals that society needs to pursue and identify its development requirements. Since its inception, SAHE has offered a number of seminars, workshops and lecture programmes for students, young women and men interested in adding to their social awareness about political economy, development, international relations and community-based synchronized development efforts, with a focus on key issues relevant for our society.

 Participation in UPE

SAHE Sialkot was allocated an area of 80 villages of Dalowali Markez and 5 urban wards (municipal constituencies) in Tehsil Sialkot and two Markez’ of Tehsil Pasroor to implement therein the UPE project. It started work it August 1999 and achieved 100% enrollment in 66 villages and 4 wards before summer vacation, June 2000.      

Staff empowerment

Although SAHE Sialkot had experienced workers in the field of social mobilization as well as teachers’ training, it organized workshops for further strengthening the capabilities of field staff. Experts from SAHE Lahore were invited for this purpose.

 Workshop on Motivation, Concept and Techniques

A five-day workshop on this topic was held during the month of October 1999, just in the beginning of the project. Mr. Masha Allah and Ms. Kishwar Sultana of SAHE Lahore were the resource persons.

Teaching Techniques & Methodologies

SAHE Sialkot, as an NGO for education, has capability to train teachers in effective teaching methodologies. Being upholders of child-centered classroom atmosphere, SAHE trainers’ team focuses upon understanding the child, needs of children, learning disabilities, joyful learning, multi-grade teaching and methodologies of teaching school subjects.

 Orientation workshops

UPE project had a component of teachers’ orientation and its need was particularly stressed in the beginning. Every ME was expected to be a teachers’ trainer also. The partner NGOs had to train all the primary teachers of the allocated area. SAHE Sialkot made elaborate preparations for this purpose. It added sessions on Understanding the Child and Learning disabilities to the module provided by UNICEF. The Orientation Workshops were held during November 1999 and 300 primary teachers of Markez Dalowali and urban areas attended.

 In order to further enhance capabilities of its staff, SAHE Sialkot has been sending its staff members to different workshops, especially on teaching methodologies, organized by various institutions and NGOs. Almost all the staff, including MEs has attended at least one such workshop. In addition, SAHE Sialkot invited trainers from SAHE Lahore and held a workshop on Multi-grade teaching techniques during May 2000. After each of such occasions the MEs share their information with teachers in Union Council level meetings.                 

Progress SAHE Sialkot

MARKIZ: DALOWALI

UNION COUNCILS: Rasoolpr Bhalian, Dalowali, Kundanpur, Bharrath, Bhoth

 Special Children (Rural):29

Shifted out of village: 3

 WARDS Nos: 4,6,7,11,22

 Special Children (Urban): 10

DETAILS OF VILLAGES WITH 100% ENROLLMENT