|
|
|
|
'Shortage of PhD teachers major hurdle in quality education'
LAHORE, Sept 14: A shortage of PhD teachers in the public sector
Universities is a big barrier in the improvement of our educational set up, said
Higher Education Commission Chairman Dr Atta-ur-rehman. HEC is working to fill
this gap, Dr Atta said at the 'Vice Chancellor's Conference' that was held at
the Governor House on Thursday. Punjab Governor, VCs of all public sector
universities of Punjab and HEC officials attended the conference.
Dr
Atta said that the HEC had approved Rs 10.418 billion for projects in Punjab
public sector universities, in addition to the already sanctioned amount of Rs
18.869 billion under the Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP). He said
that with this approval, the total funds sanctioned for Punjab's higher
education institutes for the year 2007-08 totalled Rs 35 billion.
He said
efforts had been made to bring higher education at par with international
standards. He said that our universities must meet society's needs for human
resources in fields such as medicine, industry and agriculture. He said that
Punjab requires at least 6,000 PhD scholars to meet needs of 122,000
post-graduates. He said that the province currently has 2,000 PhD scholars and
thus a huge shortfall exists. He said that our universities should not produce
students but graduates who can impact relevant sectors of society.
Dr
Atta said that the commission introduced the e-books programme. He said that HEC
had provided 40,000 free e-books, established digital libraries, linked
Pakistani institutes with foreign ones, started tenure tracking system for
teachers, hired foreign faculty, focused on research work and academic journals
and worked on improving quantity and quality of higher education institutions.
He also said that matters of governance and university leadership were areas of
vital importance.
Punjab Governor Khalid Maqbool said that focus was
laid on establishment of universities in southern Punjab. He said that funds
were available for supporting new universities, strengthening of the current
universities and faculty development. He said that the proposed development
projects would strengthen existing academic programmes, introduce 20 to 25 new
programmes and thus student enrolment would increase. He added that our
graduates would be able to fulfil the requirement of the public and private
sector.
Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Dr Akram Sheikh stressed
that universities should focus on need-based and market-oriented academic
programmes. This would lead the country to economic progress and prosperity, he
added. He said that Punjab University (PU) was currently focussing on increasing
the number of departments but there was need to develop its existing
departments. Daily Times
|
|
|
|
 |
| Post your Comments/ Views about the news. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Education News | | Updated: 25 May, 2012 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 |
|
