By Zahiruddin
CHITRAL: In Aga Khan Education Service (AKES), teacher is the major driving force in its network of schools across the district which are known for their excellence in quality education and realizing this fact, they are rewarded with a large sum of Rs.6.4 million on yearly basis.
In the function held in connection with Teachers’ Recognition Day under the aegis of AKES here on Sunday, the general manager of the organization, Brigadier (retired) Khosh Muhammad said that the progress and prosperity of Chitral directly depended on development of human resource for which quality education was unavoidable.
“He said that the more we spend on the improvement of education, the more dividends we will receive and our future will be brightened in that proportion while at present time rigorous efforts on war footings are required to realize this objective.
In Chitral, there are no sources of making progress other than developing and harnessing our human resource with special emphasis on higher education in diverse fields and disciplines and it was heartening to note that the students emerging out from AKES schools have been admitted in the leading institutions of top order of the country including IBA Karachi and others’, he said.
Regarding the rewards being conferred upon the teachers of the forty five schools run by AKES, he said that the performance of all the 370 teachers was continuously put to monitoring and assessment throughout the academic year and grading is made on performance management and reward system (PMRS), he said.
One hundred and ninety three teachers were given cash prizes and bonus of different amounts ranging from Rs.25000 to Rs.75000 on this occasion while another function had also been earlier in AKES Higher Secondary School for Boys.
A beneficiary of AKES, Dr. Tajuddin Sharar, speaking on the occasion, said that it was the organization which enabled him to earn Ph.D. degree on ‘global education’ by providing him with scholarship.
He said that the AKES had a global approach to education while giving bonus to the teachers associated with it was importance in the sense that it promoted self-assessment, creativity and innovation among them.
Renowned religious scholar Professor Shamsun Nizar Fatimi and social figure Hakeem Ali advocate also emphasized the need of quality education and said that giving due credence to the teachers, the organization has taken value steps towards the goal and termed it a kind of its own in the country.
They said that civilization and culture should also be given due weightage in the process of education which further facilitated in character building of the students and no curriculum of education was complete without this.
The appreciated the AKES for taking utmost efforts in the introduction of quality education in Chitral with special stress and focus on the accessibility of education to girls in the far-flung corners of the country where the government is yet to open schools.
