The Concession Agreements Signing Ceremony between School Education & Literacy Department, Government of Sindh and Education Management Organizations (EMOs) took place at the Chief Minister Sindh’s House, Karachi on Wednesday, January 30, 2019 at 4:00 p.m.
Group photo of the participants after signing concession agreements
The signing Ceremony kicked-off the implementation of GoS policy reform of EMOs in the next batch of state-of-the-art schools reconstructed with the support of USAID under the USD 159.2 Million for Sindh Basic Education Program. Under the Education Management Organizations reform, the GoS is entering into partnerships with credible organizations from the private sector to manage and improve the functioning of public schools under the Sindh Public Private Partnership Act 2010.
USAID Deputy Mission Director for Sindh and Balochistan, John Smith-Sreen, along with Chief Minister Sindh province Syed Murad Ali Shah, Minister for Education and Literacy Sindh Syed Sardar Ali Shah and Chief Secretary Sindh Syed Mumtaz Ali Shah witnessed the signing ceremony of concession agreements between Government of Sindh and Education Management Organizations (EMOs) to manage USAID funded 20 newly constructed state-of-the-art public schools under Sindh Basic Education Program (SBEP) and 25 high priority schools in Sukkur, Larkana, Qamber-Shahdadkot, and Dadu districts.
On this occasion, Secretary SELD, Qazi Shahid Pervaiz and two selected EMOs, i.e. Sukkur Institute of Business Administration (IBA) University and The Citizen Foundation (TCF) inked the agreements to manage these schools for a period of 10 years. SELD outsourced nine construction schools and 17 priority schools to Sukkur IBA University under district package Sukkur and Larkana. However, TCF will manage 11 newly constructed schools and eight priority schools under district package of Dadu and Qamber-Shahdadkot.
The Secretary School Education Department, Government of Sindh made a short presentation on overall progress of three rounds of EMO procurement. In addition to it, he briefed on the process and progress of fourth round of EMO procurement under district packages, which covers more children with cost effectiveness model.
During the event, John Smith-Sreen shared his views and mentioned that we are proud to be able to support the education management reform, initiated by the Government of Sindh. I am sure that such reforms and other best practices will enable students to become change makers for Pakistan, advancing our shared goals of mutual respect and tolerance. He said, the U.S. Government’s committed to support education in Pakistan and emphasized that young people are the future of Pakistan for which educational assistance is one of the United States Government’s top priorities here
Syed Sardar Ali Shah, Minister for Education and Literacy, in his remarks mentioned that today is a remarkable day and a pride moment that the children of far flung rural areas would have an opportunity to get quality education at free of cost as is and has been a vision and political commitment of the government of people in Sindh.
In the last, Syed Murad Ali Shah, Chief Minister Sindh expressed appreciation for USAID-SBEP and the U.S. Government’s strong support in modernizing education in Sindh. He also applauded Education Minister and Secretary SELD for initiating this reform. Chief Minister further said that, “We are very grateful to USAID for helping us with education reforms, especially through this public-private partnership approach which is already helping the School Education and Literacy Department. These innovative solutions are helping to improve school governance and quality of teaching.”
The USAID Pakistan officials, senior officials from Government of Sindh including secretaries and heads of various departments, officials from Sindh Basic Education Program, representatives from partner Education Management Organizations and team of Sindh Community Mobilization Program attended this program.
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CMP is a USAID-funded program that supports the Government of Sindh’s education reform and USAID’s Sindh Basic Education Program. CMP improves school resources and encourages community support for educational reform in Sindh province while identifying and addressing primary barriers to access, particularly for female students.
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