Daily Times

School closures are stressing our kids and threatening their future. Our children are going through it too and keeping them out of school makes it much worse. The pandemic is testing us all with volatile, uncertain and complex times and our children are going through it, too. The adults in the room worry about their own mental health, education and security, avoiding the virus raging around us. That ambient stress is absorbed by our youngest. And keeping them out of school makes it much worse. The latest closure of schools has not only exposed the weakness of our education system, but also added to the number of out of school children.

On October 9, Pakistan became the latest country to ban TikTok, which was part of a recent slew of platform bans in the country over the past month that includes Bigo, PUBG as well as dating apps like Tinder and Grindr. On this issue our youth and liberal groups had joined in condemning Pakistani authorities for blocking the video-sharing application TikTok. Nevertheless, there has been a great hue & cry among the youngsters who are still mourning this 'Great Loss' and being deprived of a Great Platform to display their natural Talents to the world. TikTok has 20 million monthly active users in Pakistan. Resulting Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) lifted the Tiktok, Bigo, PUBG and other apps’s ban after heavy pressure of our nation especially youth and the companies. Shockingly, the apps have been banned by the government of Pakistan and the decision came after many complaints about the usage of the gaming applications and its effects on many players in the country. The PTA forbade the use of the game as it is reportedly promoting unaccepted behaviour of children while getting involved in the game. The challenge for these apps in Pakistan lies in what constitutes immoral and indecent content, and who is the arbiter of said parameters. In 2016, the country’s parliament passed the Pakistan Electronic Crimes Act (PECA) to ultimately regulate content on the internet, and Section 37 of the legislation.

Pakistan needs TikTok, not education! More than 10,000 schools across Pakistan had already been closed permanently. It’s fear that the latest closure of schools will jeopardise the existence of 20,000 to 25,000 more low-cost schools.

On the other side, our youth rejoiced on November 23, and announced ‘Youm e Shahfqat’ when the government announced the closure of all educational institutions from November 26 to January 11. The decision was taken in the Inter-Provincial Education Ministers’ Conference (IPEMC). The closure will initially include winter vacations from December 25 to January 10. Students with online options will continue their studies through this mode of education. Respective provincial governments will make other arrangements for those lacking this facility. The government also announced the cancellation of the examinations scheduled in December. The examinations for assessment and recruitment will continue. The ban on schools was not something to rejoice. Instead, it not only sets a draconian precedent for any education system operating in Pakistan, local or foreign, but also sends a negative signal for International level already nervous about the education, so all stakeholders can have transparency, visibility, and a fair chance. The ban on schools also poses repercussions for the millions of students that use the platform of schools for creative expression, connection, and even just escape.

All Pakistan Private Schools Federation – APPSF successfully implemented SOPs in schools as success story since 15th August this year and which were praised and admired by government officials included ministers. APPSF announced that they won’t agree with the government’s decision. It will further damage the education system, students, families and the national economy. The educational institutions can work smoothly with strict implementations of the SoPs. More than 10,000 schools across Pakistan had already been closed permanently. It’s fear that the latest closure of schools will jeopardise the existence of 20,000 to 25,000 more low-cost schools.

Thousands of teachers had been rendered jobless after their schools were closed permanently because of the financial crisis. Thousands of teachers will also lose their jobs after the current closure. Most of the public and private schools did not have the resources to provide online education. Teachers and students of such schools will have no choice but to look for other options. Most of the students will either join the seminaries or get low-wage hazardous jobs. They will not come back to the schools. This will be a tragedy. About 26.1 million children were currently studying in private schools and 21.9 million children in public schools. As a result of previous lockdown, 13 million children from public and private institutions did not return to schools when they reopened.

Out of 1.5 million teachers, 0.7 million did not come back as they had got into other work after remaining jobless for months. Only 14 percent of schools and homes in Pakistan had the capacity to access online education. The most had closure hit educational institutions in Balochistan, KP, interior Sindh and southern Punjab where thousands of private schools were shut down permanently because the school managements could not the building rents and salaries. In only Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan, a large number of school children are joining the religious seminaries. They will not only remain exposed to the threat of contracting Covid-19 but also lose their path to mainstream schooling.

About 2800 private schools in KPK and Balochistan were shut down permanently because of the previous lockdown. Hundreds will not be functional after the recent decision to close the schools for nearly six weeks, the fact is parents in Balochistan have started sending their children to religious seminaries. These children will not return to the schools. The trend is spreading in other provinces and may result in increase across Pakistan.The seminaries will remain open. Madaris have the biggest board of religious seminaries in Pakistan. It runs over 35,000 registered religious seminaries employing 180,000 teachers and having 3.5 million students across Pakistan. In these circumstances, All Pakistan Private Schools Federation-APPSF also sought soft interest free bank loans to provide financial relief to small private schools and coaching centres.

Almost half of the world’s 1.6 billion primary and secondary students won’t return to school this year, Insights for Education estimates. More than 80% of these live in lower-income countries. Pakistan is a economy with 500 billion rupees of school education and it’s related allied economy with infinite opportunity which damaged bitterly. History has lessons for how children suffer through trauma like wars and natural disasters. A cratered economy also hurts. A research paper found that during the Great Recession, a 5 percentage point increase in the unemployment rate was correlated with a 35% to 50% increase in clinically meaningful childhood mental-health problems. Another thing is that there’s no conclusive, causal relationship between schoolrooms and rising infection rates. Schools reopened this fall for a few weeks, without any large outbreaks, and yet we’re now in our second round of home learning by Zoom for limited access to kids. But start-stop lockdowns make it tough for children to transition online to offline and back. Classroom habits and independence have suffered. Anecdotally, younger children who would typically start reading around this age aren’t able to pick it up and are losing confidence and interest. Research shows that child development is a hierarchical process of wiring the brain. Losing these building blocks impedes future development. These pressures on children seem a poor way to control the virus. Researchers reviewing studies of school shutdowns to contain epidemics, not a single country in all over the world did completely shut-down of school education despite of micro or smart-lockdown.

Pakistan is —the country boasts the fifth largest population in the world, with increasing smartphone penetration and a burgeoning young population, perhaps that are tech-savvy and hyper-connected only for Tiktok, Bigo, PUBG etc, but unfortunately not for education.

The writer is an economist, anchor, analyst and the President of All Pakistan Private Schools Federation. President@pakistanprivateschools.com