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Benefits of vocational, secondary education debated

By Our Staff Reporter 2015-10-30
KAR ACHI: `Should we give vocational training priority over secondary education?` That was the question pondered over by The Debating Circuit (TDC) at the Public Interest Law Association of Pakistan (PILAP) dialogue 2015 at the Pakistan American Cultural Centre here on Thursday.

The informative and thought-provoking debate had Hassaan bin Shaheen, Yelmaz Mujtaba and Mujtaba Raza for prioritising vocational training while Sarosh Hasan, Saif Shahid and Abdullah Quresh Abdullah were against the motion.

`Vocational training would give actual and concrete skills to those dropping out of schools.

It will help them to be directly included into the workforce,` said Hassaan bin Shaheen.

But Abdullah Quresh Abdullah pointed out that vocational work only brought up minimal pay jobs. `They will be plumbers, carpenters, electricians, etc, fixing rich people`s things.

Vocational training won`t increase their wages and better their lives. This way you`ll be just putting them in a shoebox where they`ll be mending shoes for the rest of their lives and worsen the social divide,` he said.Yelmaz Mujtaba, who was for the motion, then got up and said that lesser pay was still better than no pay at all. `There is no shame in being a plumber, carpenter or electrician.

There should be no stigma attached to it,` he said.

Sarosh Hasan, who was against making vocational training a priority, pointed out that countries didn`t progress on the back of plumbers and carpenters. `Individuals living below the poverty line won`t be able to move up if they stick to vocational training to earn a livelihood,` he said.

Mujtaba Raza, all for vocational training, then said: `But you should understand the priorities and putting food on the table, increasing jobs and reducing poverty in this country happen to be the need of the hour. Trained people have tremendous potential. Once the parents in a family have stable jobs, they would be able to provide better education for their children.

Women in rural areas, who have had some vocational training, too, have gained employment to provide their families a better life.

Finally, Saif Shahid, who was against the motion, said that secondary education was better than vocational training at any time.

`Secondary education makes you less conservative and less radical. It enlightens, which voca-tional training simply can`t do,` he said.

The winner of the debate according to the panel of judges PILAP president Saad Amanullah Khan, finance expert Dr Amjad Waheed and advocate Sumaiyya Zaidi was the team for making vocational training a priority over secondary education though the best speaker of the evening, Sarosh Hasan, hailed from the losing team.

Earlier, sharing PILAP`s work, Saad Amanullah Khan said that the organisation was all about public interest and the general rights of the people. `Education and healthcare is the basic fundamental right of the people,` he said.

Dr Amjad Waheed regretted that Pakistan had 50 million children of whom only 50 per cent attended school. `And of them 10pc are going to private schools while 15pc go to government schools. And while most government schools lacl< basic facilities such as boundary walls, bathrooms and clean drinking water, all private schools, too, are not like Karachi Grammar, Bayview, Beaconhouse, etc. They are small schools functioning in two to three rooms even and charging around Rs500 as fee per pupil.

Unless the government comes and plays its role, the private schools cannot fulfil the education gap. Education after all is a constitutional obligation of the government,` he concluded.