Monday, 27 April 2009 17:42
KASHMIR EDUCATION FOUNDATION (KEF) (www.kefintl.org) is providing high quality liberal education to the children especially female students of underprivileged communities of Azad Kashmir & Pakistan. KEF is a non profit, non political NGO that has to sustain its efforts through donors. The organization was founded in 1994 and has now three schools and a Teacher Training Institute, as Centres of Excellence. It is registered as a charity in U.K. (No. 1082299), USA (No. 30-0047316), Canada and Pakistan and exempted from income tax. Zakir Habib Khan, from the 16th Entry is one of the Trustees of the Foundation.
KEF is also affiliated/supported by:
o Bahria University, Islamabad (www.bahria.edu.pk);
o UK’s Volunteer Service Organization (www.vso.org.uk);
o Australia Volunteers International (www.austrianvolunteers.com)
o Gloucestershire University, U.K. (www.glos.ac.uk);
o Valentines High School, U.K (www.valentines-sch.org.uk);
o Acklam Grange School, U.K (www.acklamgrange.org.uk);
KEF has been awarded the seal of NPO Good Practices by Pakistan Centre of Philanthropy (PCP) (http://www.pcp.org.pk/resources.html#NPO Profiles).The organisations certified by PCP conform to internationally accepted best practices in internal governance, programme delivery and financial management. Out of over 60,000 NGOs in Pakistan, KEF was amongst first 45 to be certified by PCP.
KEF realised that quality education can only be provided if we have quality English medium teachers for which it set up a purpose built Institute of Teacher Education (ITE) in a village, Basali near Rawalpindi. ITE trains rural graduate females for 12-15 months to obtain a diploma that is now affiliated with Bahria University.
The first school, Pearl Valley public School has had 2 graduations of F.Sc from that school – with almost all students well placed in Universities or other institutions. The second school Soan Valley Public School is situated about 10 kms from Rawat and is five years old and is attracting pupils from a wide catchment area. The third school, Banjosa Valley Public School opened in March 2009 in the very remote area of Banjosa and has intake of over 100 pupils in class prep and class one.
Providing quality education in remote rural areas does not come cheap. Each school is subsidised and the major deficit of KEF is its Institute of Teacher Education (Rs. 4 million out of a total deficit of Rs. 7 million), once a child is admitted and cannot afford the subsidised fee, KEF supports the student.
Future projects that are in the pipeline are schools in Chakwal, Bhawalnagar, Sialkot and Mirpur. Subject to availability of finances KEF plans to initially set up an Institute of Teacher Education with an adjacent school in the other three provinces of N.W.F.P, Sindh and Baluchistan.
KEF has identified the drawbacks of Primary Education in Pakistan and has the tools to tackle them. The KEF ITE and School model requires to be replicated in all rural areas of the Country. However the Secondary Education deficiencies of the Country still remain unsolved requiring major investment in its teacher training.
During the tragic earthquake of 2005, KEF assisted the nation by providing one of the best relief shelter programs. KEF was the only NGO that came to rescue of CMH hospital that collapsed after the first snowfall. Lately KEF channelled funds by friends for a destroyed dispensary that has now been converted to a hospital. Apart from friends of KEF UNDP, IOM, Small Kindness and Government of Norway supported KEF in its relief efforts due to its transparent policy and processes. KEF also has plans to build vocational centres for women in areas for underprivileged rural areas.