Need to accelerate the pace of Education at all levels to achieve MDGs targets.

Need to accelerate the pace of Education at all levels to achieve MDGs targets.

Literacy rate of Pakistan is only 60% while Millennium Development Goals target is 80% till 2015.

“Government should allocate substantial amount and accelerate the pace of education at all levels to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) targets and improve the literacy rate in country. According to recent Economic Survey of Pakistan 2013-14 the literacy rate of the population 10 years and above is only 60% while the Millennium Development Goals target is 80% literacy rate till 2015. 

Pakistan is one of those countries who spends minimum percentage of GDP on education. All the segments of society should join hands to highlight the issues related education and put pressure on stake holders because it is a matter of survival for our future generations.” It was the consensus at editors’ round table meeting organized by ILM-O-AGAHI in Islamabad today. A number of senior journalist, editors and news directors from main stream newspapers and leading TV channels participated in the meeting.

Meeting was organized by Mishal Pakistan in collaboration with Ilm Ideas. Earlier today a training workshop on education journalism was also organized and attended by more than 25 education reporters from various mainstream news organization.

Senior journalist Matiullah Jan, while discussing about role of media, said that journalists covering education reporting should focus on more field reporting and unfortunately, education reporting is not given importance by the editors. Reporting on education can drive reader’s interest only when journalists report the complete picture.

The objective of ILM-O-AGAHI initiative is to improve accountability and media coverage of priority education issues and consensus building on education policies by engaging media.

Through the ILM-O-AGAHI initiative, 18 education journalism workshops were held across Pakistan during last two months for education reporters to increase their capacity and improve the coverage on education issues in media. In each workshop, more than 30 education reporters participated where their capacity to report on identified educational challenges enhanced and  improved understanding and skills among journalists to capture community’s perspective and voice including children’s voice.

Mishal Pakistan is the partner institute of the Center for International Media Ethics and the Global Competitiveness and Benchmarking Networks of the World Economic Forum. Mishal assists the forum in creating soft-data on Pakistan, identifying Pakistan’s competitiveness challenges including primary health & education and higher education.

For more information please visit: www.ilmoagahi.org