What is ASER?

The Annual Status of Education Report 2023 was launched on 8th March, 2024. With a sample size covering 151 rural and 123 urban districts nationally, it surveyed almost 90,000 households and 272,370 children, of which 210,000 children were assessed to measure their learning levels. 

ASER tests many as...

Over the past few years, national transformations including a pandemic, several endemics, climate crises, the digital turn, political upheavals, and conflict have impacted the educational landscape in Pakistan in ways more drastic than one can imagine. Amidst all this, our teachers have not only been stalworth in their duties to educate the children of this country but exemplary in their effort...

The 23rd Prime Minister of Pakistan almost missed out on mentioning education in his maiden speech given his compelling actions for education in Punjab during his tenure as the Chief Minister. For how long will education, and above all the fundamental right to free and compulsory education await its calling in Pakistan?  The track record of 75 years is poor. Each of the seven finalized Edu...

Learning has become a crucial area of research around the globe. The COVID Pandemic (2020-21) has suppressed vital segments of society and economic growth. In this regard, Pakistan is not an exception (Crawfurd et al., 2021). The education sector faced tough challenges pre-COVID and during the pandemic. Since the first wave of the pandemic (February 2020), educational institutions have be...

“I study in class seven … Mathematics is my favorite subject.”

We were not expecting to hear these words when we stepped out to explore the life of Jhuggi (shanty town) dwellers living beneath a flyover in Karachi, Pakistan. They were uttered by Dia*, a young girl, full of confidence. Yet, despite feeling compassion and guilt when we visited the Jhuggi, after meet...

Wandering outside the Bengali Para, Karachi-Malir, trying to find a street that would take us inside the Katchi Abadi (informal settlement), we met a young man in his early 20s, about 5.5 feet tall, of Bengali origin, standing still with his eyes stuck on a particular point in the sea. “I am waiting for my father, he will be returning home soon from that end,” he told us. We inquire...

The Learning Crisis has been on the global landscape for over a decade. It is the most critical challenge to the attainment of the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4, the successor to Millennium Development Goal 2. SDG 4 is a radical departure from access to learning.  However, the global impasse has been on how to measure ‘learning’ such that it...

Kashmir to Karachi are Girls learning?

ASER 2019 gender analysis

One of the key challenges faced by many countries in the world and Pakistan in particular is addressing gender inequality, and while there are many areas in which gender inequality is a serious issue to be tackled, this can especially be seen, as in ASER, when analyzing the state of education in Pakistan.

A...

In London, at the Education World Forum (EWF), January 21-23 this year, education ministers from across the world met. Pakistan too was well represented at the EWF 2019. The ministers celebrated innovations and interventions that have led to improved education for their citizens and shared ideas for how to drive further progress.

All 193 UN member states have committed to ensuring that ...

Over the last decade, countries across the globe have decided to actively pursue the provision of rights to differently-abled children as the main agenda in all developmental plans. This is also manifested in the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals and the declaration of Global Disability Summit 2018. Amongst these rights, the main focus has been placed on the provision of quali...

Zara is nine years old. She remains confused about learning after a tough four years in school without really understanding how to learn. Zara is and one of the 617 million children in school and struggling to learn, globally, according to Unesco.

The crisis of learning and schooling highlights the challenges of quality, equity, access and inclusion in Pakistan and low middle income cou...

THE 2017 census shows that only 0.48 per cent of Pakistanis are persons with disability. Assuming a population of 210 million, this comes to about 1m Pakistanis. Sample-based surveys show that the percentage of Pakistanis with disability is around 12pc or slightly more. This comes to about 25m Pakistanis. There is a massive difference between 1m and 25m people. Planning for a million people is ...

This blog was written by Muhammad Afzan Munir, a social researcher who is currently working at ITA/ASER Pakistan as a Senior Research Analyst. For the 2019 UKFIET conference, 17 individuals, including Afzan, were provided with bursaries to assist them to participate and present at the conference. The researchers were asked to write a short piece about their research or experience...

Ms. Sajida is a very worried teacher of grade 10, as is her colleague Ms. Najma teaching grade 8 at a government girls high school in Bahawalpur district. Ten girls did not return to school after the summer vacations. The teachers waited for a week, thinking delayed attendance is often the post vacation pattern, and then, both went to the homes of their students who were their shining stars in ...

Voluntary National Reviews (VNR) is a follow-up process of assessing Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the 2030 Agenda by each country. The VNR report has to be submitted to the United Nations for regular reviews to high-level-political forum (HLPF), under the auspices of UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC). Pakistan adopted the SDGs as the national agenda and has committed to submit th...

Today is a day to celebrate teachers, our personal and collective learning through our lifespans. Teachers include, engaged parents, grandparents, extended family members and friends who taught us our first coherent lessons for life and of course the formal teachers who influenced us throughout our lives. I can tell you that as I look back and ahead there are so many to whom I owe a lot - in al...

A Roundtable, titled "Prioritizing Inclusive Education to Create and Promote Sustainable Futures for All- Evidence from Punjab" was held on 9th February 2017 organized jointly by Idara-e-Taleem-o-Aagahi and ASER Pakistan Teams, supported by the Foundation of Society Institute. The panel was chaired by Mr. Muhammad Fazil Cheema- Director, Punjab Special Education Dep...

 On 27th January, the event, hosted by Prime Minister of Pakistan, launched Volume I of the 'Powering Pakistan for the 21st Century' report by “Pakistan Alliance for Math & Science”. Idara-e-Taleem-o-Agahi is a proud member of this alliance. Volume I is titled, "How Maths and Science Powers Nations" and presents the case for maths and science ed...

Education is an immensely powerful instrument of socio-economic and political change connected to global, technological and democratic developments. Since the inception of Pakistan, it has been evident that the task of nation building cannot be achieved without an educated and skilled workforce. Various efforts have been made since 1947 to not only highlight the imp...

Article 25-A of the constitution of Pakistan stipulates that the provincial governments provide free and compulsory education to all children between the ages 5-16 years.  Pakistan, a country marred by education crisis has allocated a meager budget - only 2% of the GDP - to education. It is hence not surprising that Pakistan failed to achieve the Millennium Dev...

We listen to the same music.

We watch the same movies.

We eat the same food.

We farm the same land.

We speak the same language.

In so many ways, India feels like a home away from home...

When a girl from a low-cost private school in Swat, Pakistan, Malala Yousafzai, wins the Nobel Peace Prize becoming the youngest winner of the most esteemed global award, and a young woman hailing from a privileged school in Karachi, Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy wins her second Oscar (2012-2016) for documentaries on women’s rights (‘Saving Face’ and &lsqu...

The countdown towards ensuring all children are learning by 2030 has begun.  This is just one aspect of an ambitious set of education targets that world leaders have signed up to as part of the sustainable development goals, but is vital as a first step on the ladder to others. A child who is unable to read or write, or do basic mathematics, is unlikely to acqu...

Meet Aditi. Aditi is 11 years old. Aditi lives with her mother and younger sister Didi, who is 7 years old. They live on the outskirts of Mumbai, in a waste-picking community. Aditi and Didi have lived here ever since they were born. Every morning, their mother leaves very early to collect used plastic to sell. Aditi used to help her mother, but now she goes to scho...

The demand for girls education has been rising in Pakistan but remains unmet due to poor access especially at post primary levels. The current net enrolment ratio for girls is 54% at primary level, declining to 21 % at mThe demand for girls education has been rising in Pakistan but remains unmet due to poor access especially at post primary levels. The current net enrolment ratio for girls is 5...

The recently launched ASER Report 2015 is a testament to civil society evidence-based activism that has drawn irreversible attention to the crisis of learning, both locally and globally. As we move forward towards the recently adopted Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), we are reminded that the ‘learning plus access’ agenda for the education SDG (SDG ) would not have hap...

On the sparkling shores of the seaside town of Saly on the Petite Côte of Senegal, 50 ambitious education activists and innovators from 15 Global South countries convened last week to explore the next crucial stage of their learning journey at the 4th Annual PAL Network meeting.

The People’s Action for Learning Network (PAL Network) is an internationally recog...

Early childhood is a crucial phase of human life, where a child is most receptive to learning. It has been proved that human brain has the capability to learn the most from birth to five years of age. An overwhelming number of research studies reveal highly positive effect of Early Childhood Education (ECE) on the success of children in the later stages of their edu...

The ASER journey that started relatively quietly in the summer of 2008 has apparently ended with a bang with the publication of the final report in 2015.No one could have predicted the scale that was finally achieved in 2015 – to sample 258, 021 children (3-16 years) in 145 rural districts covering 83,755 households using 10,000 volunteers is a tremendous victory in and of itself. To do s...

The clock is now ticking towards the goal of ensuring ‘inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all’ by 2030. For the first time, people with disabilities are explicitly recognized within the global targets. Yet, we still have too little information on how far behind children with disabilities are in education, and the...

Now the razzmatazz celebrating the launch of the Sustainable Development Goals is over, it is time to get down to business. For education (Goal 4) that means prioritizing the 250 million children who are not learning the basics, to ensure this global learning crisis is a thing of the past by 2030.

The first, and most vital, step that needs to be taken is to address disadvantage from ear...

By Baela Raza Jamil, Founding Member PAL Network and Director of Programs Idara-e-Taleem-o-Aagahi and the Institute for Professional Learning, as well as Coordinator of the South Asian Forum for Education Development. 

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In April 2012, I was invited to Lahore to present on the topic of global learning metrics at the Quality-Inequality Quandary seminar hosted by the South Asian Forum for Education Development (SAFED).  This was one of the very first consultations of the Learning Metrics Task Force (LMTF), which would eventually go on to reach more than 1,700 people in 118 countries through its global consul...

The global community has failed dismally in meeting the challenge of providing all children with a quality education. This education failure is tragically apparent in Pakistan, the world’s sixth most populous country. This failure of learning is evident both in the results of public sector examinations and private sector citizen-led household-based assessments like ASER Pakistan. More tha...

In the aftermath of the tragic attack on a school in Peshawar, killing over 100 children, who were merely realising their right to go to school, the results of the latest ASER survey turn the spotlight to an ongoing simmering catastrophe that is affecting millions of children in Pakistan. Poor quality of schooling is leaving one in four grade five students unable to read a sentence, and on...

 In the aftermath of the tragic attack on a school in Peshawar, killing over one hundred children who were merely realizing their right to go to school, the results of the latest Annual Status of Education Report survey in Pakistan launched today turn the spotlight to an on-going simmering catastrophe that is affecting millions of children.

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 [The Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) is the largest citizen-led household based survey of the quality of education in Pakistan and other countries. It aims at improving the state of learning outcomes of children and works with citizens to foster nationwide conversation and actions on learning. This year’s survey has used some innovations in data collection and incorporated ...

 By Baela Raza Jamil, who currently serves as the Director of Programs Idara-e-Taleem-o-Aagahi and the Institute for Professional Learning as well as Coordinator of the South Asian Forum for Education Development. 

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Every year, citizens in Pakistan visit 279,427 children in homes all across the country to find the answer to one question: Are Pakistan’s children learning? Released on January 8, the fifth report of the Annual Status of Education Report (ASER)—Pakistan’s largest country-wide citizen-led household based survey—shows that despite being i...

After much debate on the post 2015 education agenda on various international  forums (CIES 2014, SDG-OWG), it has been repeatedly highlighted that access plus learning should be the KEY post-2015 goal as access without learning is not sustainable. The Millennium Development Goal of achieving universal primary education in developing regions has reached about 90% - this means more kids (g...

What is education? Before you read ahead, I really want you to think about this question. To me, the true definition of education has been summarized really well, in the following quote from the book The Little Prince.

“If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up people to gather wood, divide the work and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea....

A few weeks ago I taught my students (third graders at a Karachi government school) about the continents and the oceans. Most of my girls dutifully learnt the material, excited about the maps I’d brought to class, about working in groups with their classmates, about the song I’d taught them to help with remembering, and about the stickers I’d promised to those who learnt all t...

Each time we encounter through macabre media stories about child rapes; torture on child domestic labor, child labor, young suicide bombers, cannibals eating dead children’s bodies in Bhakkar repeatedly let loose by the authorities, slums being dismantled without notice where the most vulnerable children are getting education in Pehli Kiran schools, we are reminded about the illusion of e...

Nationwide large scale annual assessments are gathering momentum across Asia and Africa making learning central to the debates on education, illustrating the power of informed citizenry to influence national and global agendas for education and learning. ASER or impact, Uwezo or capability, Beekungo or are we are in it together, Jangandoo or learn together represent an organically growing movem...

With the recent announcement of proposed post-2015 education targets, which place good quality education at their centre, it becomes paramount to make sure we are able to measure progress to achieve-relevant learning outcomes, with particular attention to gender equality and the most marginalized'. The debate on what is meant by relevant learning outcomes is likely to ensue, but in the meantime...

Since the past five years a hidden crises in education has been un-covered. This hidden crisis has to do with what goes on inside schools. The international discourse now has moved from enrollment to learning. This debate centers on the idea that there has been a lot of progress in improving enrollment rates, however there has been very little emphasis on the learning levels of children who att...