ISLAMABAD, Feb 23 (APP):Federal Minister for Education and Professional Training (MoFEPT), Rana Tanveer Hussain Thursday said that the government is committed to ensuring the provision of quality education to every child in the country and aimed to start pre-one classes in schools to provide a strong educational foundation for children.
Addressing the groundbreaking ceremony of Center of Excellence for Early Childhood Development (ECD) at the Allama Iqbal Open University (AIOU) the Minister appreciated AIOU for the initiative and congratulated the university administration on this achievement.
It is pertinent to mention here that earlier the AIOU arranged a two-day International Conference on Early Childhood Development (ECD) on February 22-23 where speakers and scholars discussed various challenges faced in the implementation of early childhood education programs and gave suggestions to overcome these issues.
The objective of the conference was to create awareness about the importance of early childhood development. The conference concluded with recommendations to promote the mission of ECD further.
Federal Secretary for Education, Aamir Ashraf Khawaja, was chief guest at the closing ceremony, while VC, AIOU Prof. Dr. Nasir Mehmood chaired closing session.
Aamir Ashraf Khawaja said that the education is a key of national development but unfortunately, we did not invest in education and health sectors during the last 75 years.
He said that MoFePT will start the feeding project in schools next year. Amir Ashraf Khawaja said that Allama Iqbal Open University drew our attention to this important sector (ECD) by organizing the conference and we will take this concept forward.
Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Dr. Nasir Mahmood said that early childhood education is an important sector and unfortunately our country has lagged in this sector among regional countries.
Dr. Nasir Mahmood said that we must take some actions to make the mission of early childhood fruitful in our schools. In this regard, we laid the foundation of ECD center in AIOU today.
Dr. Nasir Mehmood thanked all the partners and organizers for their cooperation in this conference.
