K-P shuts 150 schools having less than 50 students
HARIPUR::25 December: Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) Elementary and Secondary Education Department has closed 150 schools in the district during last three years owing to low enrolment and shifted their students and staff to nearest schools.
According to the new education policy of K-P government on the basis of enrolment and distance with other schools, all those schools having less than 50 students enrollment with the condition of 1.5, three and five kilometer distance of primary, middle and high schools respectively were closed.
Under the new K-P education policy, 150 schools of male and female were shut down during 2015 to 2017 including three boys middle schools, 141 primary schools and nine girls schools whereas students and staff of the closed schools were shifted to nearest institutions.
The people of the areas where most schools were shut down were unable to continue education of their children in the other schools owing to many reasons, some of them cannot afford to avail the facility of public transport or special vehicle for their kids while some claims that in difficult hilly areas three or five kilometers area is not as easy as in plain areas so they would prefer to stop education of their kids particularly female students.
Union Council Beatgali General Member Tehsil Council Ghazi Qari Noor Hussain said that after closure of his village primary female school where 27 students were enrolled fifteen to twenty students left education as their schools were merged with Lall Khanpur Kaneer Banda which was 1.5 kilometers away from their village, but owing to difficult terrain parents did not allow their children to go.
He further said that the victim of the K-P new education policy are the people of hilly areas where usually roads and traffic are not available and parents don’t want to send their children particularly female students in the schools in the prevailing situation.
District Education Officer (DEO) Haripur Omer Khan Kundi said that we have shutdown 100 primary schools which were established as one room one teacher Masjid schools and later converted in primary schools and moreover, they failed to overcome low enrolment and were shifted to nearest schools.Published in The Express Tribune,
