Schools Everywhere

Okay my very first blog is about schools everywhere. Reason? Lots!

What I mean is I can see schools everywhere now, after every house or beside every pan-shop. You will find four to five(atleast 2) schools in almost every street of Karachi.

Now, the first question is, why am I so bothered?? Are you? Am I?

I am, and of course I am, and everyone should be as well. Now everyone and anyone can open their own school. All you need is some amount to be able to start a new school and that’s it !! NO OTHER REQUIREMENTS!! Whether you are qualified or not, capable or not. It seems like it’s the cheapest business on earth(well, atleast in Karachi, so it seems) which can be an earning machine once you are known to people around the school.

Due to non-requirement issue, you will end up having your child admitted in a school whose aim is not to give quality education but just to gather as many children as they can and earn. Why won’t they be able to have many children,when the monthly fees is very affordable(which is very good on the child’s part),some schools give discount on admission fees and some even have big banners mentioning “NO ADMISSION FEES, FREE UNIFORM AND FREE BOOKS”. A w0w-moment for the pre-school-ill-knowledged parents.



Now,because it’s just anyone who can open a school here, all they care about is to have a building where they can dump as many children as they can ,they don’t consider the salary they have to offer to teachers. No proper plan for the salary scale at all!! Most of the schools charge the students very high, but cannot pay the teacher the salary she deserves, for example, a school is taking Rs. 1500 from each student and they have min of 30 to 35 students in a class, they would start their negotiation with the teacher with the amount Rs. 3000!! there are even which starts with Rs.2000.

And it would be a shock for you who don’t know about this,but yeah there are some very needy women who agree to this scale just because “something is better than nothing” out of 3000,2000 would be for transport and at least they are able to take 1000 home(that’s what they think) and to my dismay I came to know that even the renowned and big schools here have teachers working for Rs.5000 with them and the fees per student ranges from Rs. 3500 to Rs. 7000. huh!!! That’s not fair at all!! I mean when you are well-known and people come to you for admissions you should have a lot to offer to students as well, and for that its the teachers who work hard to maintain the standard and fulfill all requirements. So that’s not what they really deserve.

The last but not the least reason to be bothered about schools everywhere and that is, decrease in quality education. As the number of schools increase, the quality of education decrease. Reasons are obvious. First, the reason to open a school now is not to educate children,or not because they love teaching kids but because they think it’s a very good business!! 2nd reason is since a masters degree holder won’t work for just Rs. 5000, they hire a 10th or a 12th grader who would agree to work for not more than 5000. So,how can you expect dedication, involvement and hard work from those teachers?? How can you expect them to be teaching up to the mark when they themselves are still into schooling and needs to learn. So where on earth has quality education gone????

But friends there are very rare exceptional cases which I have seen as per my experience , there are people who do not have money but are very willing to open a school for the love of educating others, there are undergrad teachers who can teach better than a B.Ed teacher , there are schools who pay less because that’s what they can afford as they do not take much fees from students.

But these are very few schools and yeah you will still find sincerity in some. I will write in detail about schools next time and regarding specific pre-primary experience that I have with several schools. Keep in touch!

Happy schooling! (0: