Pakistani readiness of education vision 2050
YES, we are ready in terms of experiencing but not at all for practicing in the classroom, which calls for the techniques like flipped learning and digitally innovative classroom to equip the learners with the much-needed skills of the 21st Century rather than insisting on earning degrees with higher grades of CGPs.
The world is to rush toward the ‘Metaverse,’ Artificial Intelligence and Virtual Reality. It is not only an alarming bell for us but also a litmus test to see where we stand in the readiness for 21st Century needs and demands.
So far, Pakistan has not been able to provide such an infrastructure of the education system to its young people, for which partly the lack of funding may be responsible.
Still, lack of will has been hindering our progress in education. Our postcolonial background has vigorously hindered our thinking minds from coming forward and moving forward in the brave new world and has kept us chained to the colonial goals and targets of education.
But the time has come now and is knocking at our doors vigorously to put aside our traditional modes of teaching and imparting instructions to our students and to enforce the concept of flipped classrooms and practically innovative techniques so that our students may be able to not only claim their share in the job market of the world but also help Pakistan become a robust economy.
The concept of the flipped classroom, introduced by Jonathan Bergman and Aaron Samsin 2007,calls for a student-oriented approach and urges and demands both the teacher and the students to work on the learning patterns that are not simply connected with the passages of a textbook but are more relevantly stressing the life experiences and practical examples to be incorporated in the classroom.
Further, it narrates the issues and problems, not for their sake but to find solutions with a get-it-done approach.
So, the teacher provides the keynotes, relevant material and the purpose of his classroom lecture before teaching.
The learners should come to the class with a (30 to 40 percent) pre-class understanding of the topic.
The classroom discusses the concept in detail and puts it into practical shape so a product is generated.
At the end of the class, a few short tests can be proposed to assess if the learning has gone on the right footing.
The matter, however, becomes deplorable when such a classroom is not implemented practically because neither our teacher is ready for this nor our educational infrastructure is capable of supporting such a path of learning.
A few universities may have upgraded their traditional classrooms to digitally equipped classrooms and brought internet inside the classroom.
Most of our schools, colleges and universities still provide degrees without attaching any skills to the learners.
So, the job market is flooded with jobless people because of the mismatching of degrees and the job market’s needs.
Research and innovation are impossible in a traditional and poorly equipped educational environment.
Instead of buying costly hard copies of the books and maintaining libraries even in the 21st Century, we must turn to ebraries and spend the saved money on developing infrastructure for 21st-century classrooms.
Thanks to the solar systems technology that can provide uninterrupted electricity to the classrooms. Moreover, there is little collaboration between the job market and educational institutions.
The industrialists, the consumer market, and businesses must align with the educational policy and implementation to provide the job market with a product that can readily fit the demands of the job market.
For this purpose, not only the movers and shakers of the job market may be brought to visit the educational institutions constantly, but also the students must be forced to undergo internships in all types of industries and businesses which must be made a part of their courses and examinations.
Inter-university liaisons must be created primarily with highly advanced countries to inform students about the latest trends and praxis of education employed to provide a futuristically adjustable worker to society.
It is, therefore, needed at this hour that we may spend more on the classrooms to upgrade them to cater to the needs of the 21st-century job market and to keep our faculty engaged directly in the 21st-century realities through online and virtual training and staff development programs in which not simple trainers but the experts who matter and run the market and businesses, maybe the part of such staff development programs.
The Pakistani nation is intelligent and versatile enough to not only engage in the 21st Century vision 2050 education but also can take their responsibilities as future citizens.
The only thing required is the political will to take Pakistan and its people into the world’s new and fast emerging realities.
—The writer is a Professor of English at Emerson University, Multan, and has a vast international exposure.
