Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: A tripartite Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was inked between the American Refugee Committee-Pakistan (ARC-Pak), Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and The NGO World in Islamabad.

The purpose of the MoU was to further the cause of education in Sindh. This MoU is part of Educate a Child programme Pakistan which is initiated nationwide with the support of Education Above All, Qatar. The aim of this programme is to enrol one million out-of-school children through formal and informal educational system.

Also one of the main goals of the programme is to build the capacity of government teachers through various trainings.

Focused on innovation, high-quality delivery and geographic diversification, ARC is bringing new value to the people of Pakistan. Today, ARC stands amongst the leading partners of government of Pakistan that are contributing to education, health and socio-economic empowerment through social innovation. The project of bringing million kids to school with the collaboration of Ministry of Federal Education & Professional Training, Education Above All-Qatar, JICA and other partners shows collaborative approach adopted by the ARC-Pak to bring the revolutionary change in the realm of education in Pakistan.

The literacy in Sindh is recorded at 60 percent, just behind the Punjab province, which enjoys the highest literacy rate in Pakistan with a literate population of 62 percent. There are approximately 10 million children of school-going age above five years in Sindh. However, only 3.4 million children out of this are enrolled in educational institutions while an alarming 6.6 million are out-of-school.

To narrow this gap, there are non-formal schools, where about 6.7 percent of children are currently enrolled. This demonstrates that an alternative learning path exists in Sindh which needs to be further explored.

During the MoU signing ceremony programme, ARC-Pak Head Dr Arsalan Malik said that ARC-Pak has developed a collaborative model to further the cause of education in Pakistan through bringing all the stakeholders together so daunting task of bringing a million out-of-school children to school is achieved. Ceremony was attended by JICA-Aqal Chief Adviser Chiho Ohashi, The Next Web Executive Director Zafar Iqbal, ARC-Pak National Programme Manager Zulfiqar Ali Shah and Arsalan Malik.

Participants of the event reiterated their mission of working together to achieve 100 percent literacy in Pakistan.

Published in Daily Times, July 3^rd 2018.