MOSQUE SCHOOLS IN BALOCILISTAN PAMELA SEQUEIRA PRIMARY EDUCATION DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMME JANUARY 1992 MOSQUE SCHOOLS IN BALOCIIISTAN 1. INTRODUCTION 1.1 Background Pakistan is considered to be one of the religious countries of the world where the influence of the Religious Institutions is significant in the minds of the people, especially those who are living in the rural areas. Keeping this in view the Government thought of using this factor in promoting female education in the rural areas through these religious institutions which are called "Mosques". The Government came up with a Policy of using the Mosque as Schools. The "Mosque School policy" which was implemented in 1978-79 was considering the illiteracy rate and the lack of educational opportunities in the rural areas of Pakistan. The Expansion of Primary Education was held back due to the following factors: 1. The insufficient number of school buildings in the villages, the lack of funds with the Government for building new Schools, and the lack of space available for building new Schools. 2. There are not enough facilities provided in the School. For instance, there are very few large rooms, no drinking water etc. 3. Parents reluctance in sending their daughters to a School where a male teacher is sanctioned. 4. The difficulty of finding qualified female teachers in rural areas. Therefore, the Mosque School Policy was to be taken into consideration so that the literacy rate and the female enrollment of the rural areas of Pakistan could be increased 1.2 Rationale for mosque schools: 1. It was thought that Parents wouid feel more comfortable sending their daughters to a Mosque rather than to a Primary School because they associate a great amount of trust on these Religious Leaders. 2. The Mosque Schools, were to run for 4 hours each day leaving sufficient time for the children to work at home with their parents. 3. Teachers in small villages often tend to remain absent from the School, and therefore the students suffer. "Mosque School Policy" intended to eliminate this problem by giving the Pesh Imam a stipend to teach in the School. It was thought that the presence of the Pesh Imam would help prevent teachers from taking unauthorized leaves. 1 1.3 Features of Mosque schools: 1. A Mosque School was to be opened in those villages where no Primary Schools exist. 2. The Mosques are not in use during the mornings and they can serve the purpose of a School because Mosques are clean, spacious, have drinking water, better facilities and a Pesh Imam who can teach the children the Religious Subjects. 3. Each Mosque School was to be sanctioned a JV teacher who will teach in that School. In addition the Pesh Imam was to be given Rs. 150 per month for teaching Religion. 4. Schools were to follow the regular Government Primary School curriculum. 5. The Mosque Schools would normally be till class 3. Thereafter students would be eligible for admission in class 4 in any other Primary School. 6. Since the Pesh Imam would also be teaching in the School, mosque schools were to known as two teacher schools. 7. School timings were to be set up in such a way as not to conflict with the prayer timings. 2. HAVE MOSQUE SCHOOLS BEEN SUCCESSFUL IN BALOCHISTAN ? According to one report, female enrollment in Mosque Schools is significant in sindh and Punjab but quite low in N.W.F.P and Balochistan.1 According to a report on Kashmir, Mosque Schools have not been successful in increasing female enrollment, but on the contrary they have been successful in increasing boys enrollment. The response of the education authorities in that province has been to encourage boys to attend mosque schools, while using provincial 2 government funds for the establishment of girls primary schools. It is difficult tc, evaluate the success of the Mosque schools program prior to 1990 in Balochistan. Although a major objective of the Mosque Schools was to increase the female enrollment in the rural areas, fernale enrollment in Mosque schools has not been recorded in the Educational Statistical Yearbooks published by the Directorateof Education in Balochistan. However, during 1990 BEMIS (Balochistan Education Management Information System) conducted the first School Census which included gender-wise enrollments in every school in Balochistan. Report # 7, Harvard University. " The Impact of the Mosque School policy on girls". 2. Report on Kashmir by Dr. William Darnell and Ms. Uzma Anzar. 2 2.1 Indicators of success We will measure the Success of the Mosque Schools by examining the following factors: * Are Mosque facilities being utilized for mosque schools? * Do mosque schools encourage girls participation in primary education? * Other factors. 2.1.1 Are Mosque facilities being utilized for Mosque schools ? One of the main justifications for the Mosque Schools was that since there is a lack of land available, lack of Financial Support, and insufficient facilities for building schools in each and every village, the Mosques can be used as Schools. The Mosque remains empty during the morning hours and sc a school can easily function during that time. Almost each and every village has a Mosque with spacious room and adequate facilities. However, 1990 data shows that many Mosque Schools did not utilize the mosque facilities. Nearly 55% Mosque Schools are actually using the facilities of the Mosques. The remaining mosque schools are physically located in other facilities, often buildings owned by the provincial government. In other words, 1990 data shows that in Balochistan only 956 Mosques are being used as Schools, about 741 Mosque Schools are in buildings that belong to the Government. ( Table 1) A similar conclusion is suggested by a Survey conducted in Loralai and Pishin, by the Deputy Director of Curriculum, Mr. Mobeen Shah. In asking the question whether the Mosque School is in Mosques or in other buildings, almost 90% of the mosque Schools survey are located in other buildings or in additional rooms built beside the Mosque . Once again it can be seen that the Mosque facilities are not being utilized. Since 40% of all Mosque Schools are physically located in other buildings besides the Mosque, it can be said that the objective of using existing mosque facilities to promote primary education has not been accomplished successfully. If additional facilities are to be constructed for mosque schools then the Government may as well build regular government primary schools. 2.1.2 Do Mosque schools encourage girls participation in Primary education ? Currently, there are about 2345 Mosque Schools in Balochistan Province. These comprise nearly 55% of the total number of Primary Schools in the Province. Out of these 1574 are boys, 12 are girl's and 759 are mixed Mosque schools. 3 a. Comparison of primary school vs mosque school enrollments The enrollment in mosque schools is very low compared to Government primary schools. * The total enrollment in the Mosque Schools is 78932. 70538 are boys and 8394 are girls, whereas in the Primary schools the total enrollment, from class kachi-3 is 158396. 34116 are girls and 124280 are boys. * 32% of the total Primary enrollment of Boys go to the Mosque Schools and 68% to Government Primary schools. 18% of the total Primary enrollment of Girls go to Mosque Schools and 82% to Government primary schools. (See Table 2) * Mosque schools enrollment comprises only 10 % of girls and the remaining 90% are boys. Thus, despite the fact that mosque schools comprise 55% of all primary schools in the province, they enroll only 32% of all primary boys and 18% of all primary girls. Since only 10% of mosque school enrollments are girls, it appears that the objective of using mosque schools to promote female enrollment has not been met. Despite the fact that there are more Mosque schools than primary schools in the province the enrollment of boys in primary schools is 124280 (67.8% of the total), whereas the boys enrollment in Mosque Schools is 61000 (32.2%). The girls enrollment in Primary Schools is 34116 (81.9%) whereas, in the Mosque Schools it is only 7911 (18.1%). The Districts with high enrollments of boys are Loralai, Pishin, Quetta, and Khuzdar with the highest enrollment is Quetta , whereas in Mosque Schools the district with high enrollment is Khuzdar Jaffarabad and Loralai. The Districts with high enrollment of girls in Primary Schools is Quetta and Pishin with the highest in Quetta, whereas in the Mosque Schools the highest enrollment is in Turbat District. (Table 3 where the enroll) b. Differential enrollment district-wise The enrollments in the Mosque Schools differ in various districts. The total student enrollment is the highest in Pishin district(8759) whereas, the lowest is in Dera Bugti(677). One reason for this difference is due to the fact that most of the districts in Balochistan are under the influence of the Sardars and Maliks. If the Malik does not want a School to function in his village then it is very difficult for school to operate there. The female enrollment in the Mosque Schools is very low. The highest female enrollment is in District Turbat with 1536 female students, (19.1%) and the lowest is in Dera Bugti district with 0 enrollment. The vast difference can be seen from the above 4 situation. For boys, the highest enrollment is in Pishin District and the lowest in Kohlu. The range is from 9591-803 (13.5% and 1.1%). The Mosque Schools purpose of increasing female enrollment seems to be successful in only a few districts, for instance Division Mekran has a significant female enrollment. (Table 4) c.