“Massive funding for Pakistan’s ailing universities holds many lessons for other developing nations”, states the editorial of this week’s edition of Nature, published today. Nature, which is one of the most respected scientific journal, highlights the successes of Pakistan’s higher education reforms initiated in 2002, citing the free national digital library, high-speed internet access for universities and the foreign scholarship program as examples of successes. The editorial, which accompanies an opinion article by lead author Athar Osama, however calls for more accountability and oversight of these reforms by a body comprising of academics and parliamentarians not affiliated with Higher Education Commission (HEC). While not accusing the HEC of any serious mismanagement, the editorial points out to lack of investment in the social sciences as an example of a ‘blind spot’ that public oversight may have been able to avoid.
The more detailed opinion article in the current issue of Nature is co-authored by a distinguished team, including the lead author Athar Osama, a science and innovation policy researcher, former minister of education, science and technology Shams Kassim-Lakha, the director of Boston University’s Pardee Center, Adil Najam, Christopher King of ScienceWatch.com and Syed Zulfiqar Gilani of the Institute of Education and Research, University of Peshawar and a board member of Seneca College.
The article, titled “Pakistan’s Reform Experiment“, overall takes a positive view of HEC’s reforms, stating that “the HEC seems to have changed the culture of Pakistani academia considerably over the past 5 years”. Using data from Thompson Reuters, the authors show that the impact of papers from Pakistan, relative to the average of the field, has improved significantly in Mathematics and Engineering over the last five years. In fact, papers from Pakistan in Mathematics have 20% higher impact factor than the world average! In comparison, papers in fields other than engineering and mathematics have not seen a significant improvement in the relative impact, which may be consistent with more HEC money targeted at technical disciplines.
At the same time, the article points out some potential pitfalls that the HEC needs to avoid. HEC cannot be the “initiator, implementer and evaluator” at the same time. Accountability of HEC initiatives by academics is necessary. The pace of reform has led to resistance by the universities, (a fact acknowledged by HEC Executive Director in our earlier interview), and HEC has not been fully successful in winning over that resistance. The attempt to produce too many PhDs in local universities may have compromised the quality of the PhD degree significantly. And leaving behind certain disciplines in the favor of others, especially critically important areas such as the social sciences, has not been the most prudent of policies.
We feel that the article is a well-balanced analysis of HEC’s performance. There is no doubt that the landscape of higher education has changed for the better, in a very short amount of time. However, it is also clear that higher education reform is a long term agenda. What is important is not how many grants are funded, but whether scholarship is thriving in the country or not. The conclusion of the article aptly makes this point:
The HEC has, over the past few years, made considerable progress. Its success, however, must not be measured by the number of grants made or PhDs awarded. Rather it should be judged on whether it is creating a culture of research — one driven not by financial incentives, but by a genuine desire to create new knowledge and to enable the broader society to reap the benefits. While that remains to be seen, Pakistan’s experience has useful lessons for other countries.
The article comes at an appropriate time, as the new Chairman of HEC, Dr Javaid Laghari takes over (see our posts here, and here). It provides an objective analysis to the new chairman, as he will take on the review of the previous policies and initiatives.
Coming up soon: We, at STEP, contacted the lead author of the study, Dr Athar Osama. Coming soon are his replies on what led to this study, what data sources and methodologies were used and what was the most surprising finding of this study.
Photocredit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/leena/2488225767/
The HEC debate continues, with Dr Hoodbhoy’s response to the article in the week’s issue of Nature: http://bit.ly/TprL7
This is absolutely true that Dr. Atta ur Rahman,s contributions towards science and technology are really memorable for ever. May Allah bless him with great satisfaction and bless him a long life with Pakistani nation. We the Pakistani nation is not so good to there hero in facts so I request Professor Atta Sahib not to mind if any one do not acknowledge. Professor Atta is not less than Dr. Younas of Bangla and Mahatir of Malaysia and so on
[...] The Higher Education Commission in Pakistan has recently been the focus of an article in Nature that analysed the structural changes made over the past 7 years, and the ramifications of these changes. The article even claimed that these changes can serve as a model for other developing countries to enhance the quality and quantity of their higher education research. You can read more about the article here. [...]
First let us remember the stagnation which had overtaken the Universities in the decades before 2003 and pay the devil his due. The HEC under Dr Atta has certainly been able to reverse the financial starvation faced by Pakistani Universities in the last 35 years and Dr Atta deserves praise for getting the necessary funds and support from state institutions. Funding levels have been raised several fold, more papers published, and many more young men sent abroad for PhD, after a lapse of many years.
This is the good part.
The flip side is that HEC went on a bit of a spending binge and our Universities are still not the centres of intellectual dynamism one may have expected from the relative massive increase in funding, especially in the social sciences.
The HEC needs to pause now, take a serious second look at all its programmes, and improve both its own internal efficiencies and those of its client universities. It has fortunately rolled back (actually forced to do so by circumstances not by choice) its highly expensive programme for establishing ‘foreign’ university campuses in Pakistan, which had clouded the good work done by it. HEC needs now to consolidate and stop further expansion in the number of universities, so that the desired intellectual ambience can take root on our campuses. I am afraid this has not really happened, and quality has suffered.
A comment, if I may, about the thousands sent abroad for PhD. There is considerable worry in many Universities about the breadth of knowledge and competence of these young men. Could this have to do with the fact that the HEC is now pretty much scraping close to the bottom of the barrel to find suitable candidates? Could the foreign hosts be taking them in because they have financial problems of their own and welcome foreign funds to subsidise their own nationals.
Perhaps, we should fund our scholars ONLY for Master’s programmes (18- 24 months), and let the host University fund the candidate after this period if he/she is up to the mark. Let us remember that research and higher studies is in distress in these host countries in terms of funds and the number of their nationals willing to enter the arena; they badly need young foreign minds to fill the gap.
The HEC now needs to change into a different operational mode. The sustainability of present funding levels is doubtful in the long run. No new Universities, please, in spite of what the politicians declare on their visits.
As for research, funding must now be built around researchers and not for setting up a so called infrastructure. In an earlier incarnation, I would intervene considerably to find the ‘poles’ around which the academic tent could be erected. Not very successfully, I admit!
A comment about the insistence on a PhD degree for faculty evaluation and promotion. The number of papers is increasing, but the ability to teach and transmit and to nurture the thinking mind is suffering. So the so called evaluation rules on this subject need a major review.
The HEC is setting up Universities the same way as degree colleges were set up in yester years. It must move away from the ‘college’ syndrome and allow the Universities to become bigger in size (student population) as well as making them ‘universal’ in pursuit of learning. This requires HEC to encourage multi discipline campuses where the social sciences civilize the scientists and engineers and medics. Can we have research in our medical universities without good biologists, chemists, biophysicists and the dreaded biotechnologists? Can we expect our scientists to design their own test equipment without good mechanical and electronic workshops? And can the engineers expect to do research without the exciting presence of physicists, chemists and biologists in their midst on the Campus? I am afraid not!
AND of course all these scientists, engineers, IT chaps and computer wizards have the right to be civilized by rubbing shoulders with social scientists, literature buffs, , economists, historians anthropologists etc.
Finally, as a member of the Steering Committee on Higher Education (SCHE) set up by Pres. Musharraf in 2002, which led to the establishment of the HEC, I would have been happier, (and the article in Nature would have carried more weight), if its authors had been not been members of the SCHE team, whether directly as Members of SCHE or indirectly as proof readers and language correctors)!