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Pakistan's Punjab province has witnessed numerous education reforms in recent years. Many of these reforms have been aimed at improving the well-documented low levels of learning by focusing on improving teaching quality. The rhetoric suggests that government schools, particularly those in rural areas with a more disadvantaged pupil base, are especially ineffective at imparting learning. This paper seeks to investigate whether children in rural Punjab are learning literacy and numeracy over the course of a year, and if so, are some pupils progressing more than others. Using recently collected data, it finds that children in our sample are making progress. Variation in progress is found to be greater within schools rather than across them. The competence and qualifications of a teacher also makes a significant difference to a child's academic progress. The paper further finds differential progress for rich and poor students within schools, suggesting an important role for education policy to put in place targeted support towards those from disadvantaged backgrounds to ensure improvements in their learning keep pace with their peers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rural poverty is often discussed in combination with spatial inequality where rural poor face worse problems with diverse remedies in comparison to urban poor. The present study aims to find out area-level effects and possible determinants of rural poverty based on data from the Rural Household Panel Survey of Pakistan Round-1 (2012). The multilevel binary logistic model is used to integrate concurrent individual and district-level variables to explore area-level effects on poverty. A two-level multilevel model is used for the analysis of the poverty status of 4804 respondents nested in 19 districts. Individual-level variables included in the model are education, socioeconomic status, and spending behaviour. It is found that approximately 60% of individuals of the overall population were found poor, and district-level effect accounts for 7% variations in poverty. A particularly significant ratio of poor is found for people who attained deeni madrassa/religious education or no education at all. Poverty existence is significantly associated with spending behavior and socioeconomic status. The persons with relatively middle/high socioeconomic status and successful educational achievement but a lacking attitude toward spending money are considered poor. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The problem of students dropping out of school is one of the barriers to improving educational outcomes in poor and developing countries. Purpose: This small scale, in-depth study sought to explore the phenomenon of students who drop out from secondary education, through the perspectives of fathers of such students in a rural district of Pakistan. Method: Primary data were collected through detailed, individual interviews with 14 fathers whose sons had dropped out from secondary education. The study adopted a framework involving push and pull factors to analyse qualitatively the processes and examine the reasons for dropping out that prevailed inside and outside school. Findings: The analysis suggested that, from the perspectives of the fathers, family poverty, poor academic performance and issues relating to teachers' engagement with teaching at school were main factors involved in a student dropping out of school. Conclusions: The findings from this small scale, detailed analysis of data draw attention to the issues arising from a tension in mainstream teachers' educational roles in and beyond the school. It further highlights the need for greater investment in secondary education, in order to help to reduce rates of student drop out in the remote rural areas of Pakistan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article attempts to provide insights into selected features of Pakistan’s most wanted terrorists using a dataset of 895 high-profile terrorists provided by the Counter Terrorism Wings of the Criminal Investigation Departments of regional police offices of Pakistan. It identifies spatial patterns of terrorist supply at subnational levels. The educational background of terrorists has also been analyzed. Noteworthy variations are observed in the supply of different types of terrorists across the geographical landscape of Pakistan. Findings also reveal that though terrorists are relatively more educated than the population group they emerge from, there is a higher probability of them emerging in districts with lower socio-economic performance. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]