STEP – Science, Technology, and Education in Pakistan

Last month representatives from Carnegie Mellon University met with the administrators of various Pakistani universities, and the leadership at the HEC, to explore the possibility of establishing mutually beneficial collaboration between universities in Pakistan and Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, USA.

“Heinz [College at the CMU campus in] Australia began to notice a growing population of Pakistani students in its Master’s programs and that they were some of the best and brightest of their overall class.  This was supported by anecdotal evidence both in Pittsburgh and Doha and we decided to, as we say in the states, ‘check this out’,” said Bryan Tamburro, Senior Director for Strategic Initiatives at CMU, who visited Pakistan last month with Prof. Chuck Thorpe, the outgoing Dean of CMU Qatar. “I believe this growing population of top talent from Pakistan is a direct result of HEC’s efforts to increase Pakistan’s capacity to deliver world class quality higher education to its college age population (17-25).”

Bryan and Chuck visited the campuses of NUST, COMSATS, GIKI, NDU and met with the rector of IBA Karachi in Islamabad. They were impressed by the state of affairs of higher education in Pakistan, particularly in contrast to other countries in South Asia. During the trip, Bryan and Chuck also met Dr. Ata-ur-Rehman, former Chairman of the HEC, Dr. Khurram Afridi, Project Director of the LUMS SSE, and with Dr. Sohail Naqvi, the Executive Director of the HEC.

Bryan said that, given his experiences throughout South Asia over the past twelve years, he had tempered expectations for what they would experience in Pakistan. But, he was pleasantly surprised by what they found after their visit. “I was wrong! I believe that the HEC, through nationalizing the accreditation process of Higher Education for Pakistan, has made significant progress in addressing the nation’s capacity issue, while strengthening facilities and with an incredible focus on faculty development, is succeeding where many other ‘developing nations’ are failing.”

He went on to say, “[s]imply put, you can erect a building on campus but the building doesn’t educate the student the faculty member does and that, for some reason, is the one thing strangely missing in many nations efforts to build quality higher education. This is the significant accomplishment of the HEC that helps separate Pakistan from other nations.”

Currently, administrators at CMU are considering avenues of sustainable collaboration with various Pakistani Institutions. Carnegie Mellon currently has presence in a number of countries, including Qatar, Portugal, Japan, Australia, and Cyprus, offering graduate and undergraduate courses.

Editor’s note: We previously reported that the visitors met with Prime Minister Gillani. While they were scheduled to meet, the meeting was canceled due to the Prime Minister’s scheduling conflicts.