The government has abolished the B-form — or Child Registration Certificate (CRC) — requirement for admission to federal government schools.
Geo reports that according to Education Secretary Mohiuddin Wani, the B-form has been one of the major reasons for the growing number of out-of-school children, disproportionately affecting vulnerable populations.
All children residing in Islamabad, regardless of their documentation status, will now be eligible for admission to government schools.
Some of UK’s top universities could see their attractiveness decline due to hits to funding and tighter regulations on overseas students, the annual QS 2025 university rankings warned on Tuesday.
Four British universities retained their spots in the top 10 of more than 1,000 universities ranked by Quacquarelli Symonds (QS), a benchmark ranking alongside the Times and Shanghai Jiao Tong University.
Imperial College London, renowned for its science teaching, shot up from sixth to second place, dethroning for the first time the historically dominant “Oxbridge” duo, with Oxford and Cambridge ranking third and fifth respectively.
More than half (52) of the UK’s universities were bumped down on the list, out of the 90 that were part of the ranking.
“This year’s results suggest that British higher education has limited capacity remaining to continue excelling in the face of funding shortages, drops in student applications,” and restrictions affecting the intake of international students, said head of QS Jessica Turner.
In the last few months, the Conservative government has introduced several measures to reduce regular migration which it judges to be too high.
These including barring overseas students from bringing dependents and hiking the minimum salary needed for skilled workers visas.
The policies have been criticised by universities, whose budgets are heavily dependent on the higher fees paid by international students.
In the first four months of the year, 30,000 fewer student visa applications were made than in the same period in 2023, according to government statistics.
Lahore (Pakistan) (AFP) – At a school for the deaf in Pakistan, the faces of students are animated, their smiles mischievous, as their hands twirl in tandem with their sign language teacher.
The quiet classes exude joy, led often by teachers who are also deaf.
“I have friends, I communicate with them, joke with them, we share our stories with each other about what we have done and not done, we support each other,” said Qurat-ul-Ain, an 18-year-old deaf woman who joined the school a year ago.
More than 200 pupils, children and adults mostly from disadvantaged backgrounds, are among the few given a new fervour for life at this inner-city school in historic Lahore.
Of more than a million deaf school-age children in Pakistan, less than five percent go to school.
The figure is even lower for girls and, without a language to express themselves, many children are marginalised by society and even their families.
“Life is a little difficult. There is a huge communication gap here where people generally don’t know sign language,” said Qurat-ul-Ain.
At the school run by charity Deaf Reach, pupils learn sign language in English and Urdu before progressing on to the national curriculum.
Everyone has a name in sign language, which often has to do with a physical characteristic.
Younger children learn with visuals: a word and a sign are associated with an image.
Their peers turn their thumbs down for a wrong answer and make the applause sign — twisting hands –- for a correct one.
Founded in 1998 by an American and funded with donations, Deaf Reach now has eight schools across the country, educating 2,000 students on a “pay what you can afford” basis, with 98 percent of children on scholarships.
The vast majority of students at the school come from hearing families, who are also offered the chance to learn how to sign and break the language barrier with their son or daughter.
Adeela Ejaz explained how she struggled to come to terms with her first born son — now 10 years old — being deaf.
“When I couldn’t understand what he was trying to say he would bang his head against the wall and floor,” the 35-year-old told AFP.
“It was tough for everyone because no-one knew how to communicate with him. Everyone would tell us he is deaf but I wasn’t prepared to accept that.”
The mother and son pair are now both learning to sign.
“I am getting better at signing and I am able to communicate with my son. He’s now become so attached to me.”
The programme makes extensive use of technology, and offers an online dictionary and a phone app.
It has also found employment for more than 2,000 deaf people with around 50 Pakistani companies.
Huzaifa, 26, who became deaf after contracting a fever at a young age, was given a stitching apprenticeship at Deaf Reach to help him into the skilled workforce.
“Teachers in the government school didn’t know any sign language. They would just write notes on the board and tell us to copy it. We used to get really disheartened, and I would be extremely worried for my future,” he told AFP.
His family pushed for him to become educated, helping him to learn the basics of sign language before he received formal coaching.
“My parents never threw me away. They spared no effort in ensuring I was able to continue my education,” he said.
Without their dedication, he said: “I’d be working as a day labourer somewhere, cutting leaves or cementing walls.”
Sign language varies from one country to another, with its own associated culture, and regional variations sometimes exist.
According to World Federation of the Deaf, 80 percent of the approximately 70 million deaf people in the world have no access to education.
“I used to sit idly at home, use the mobile or play outside. I never had a clue about what people were saying,” said Faizan, 21, who has been at Deaf Reach for 11 years and dreams of working abroad.
“Before learning how to sign I used to feel very weak mentally and had an inferiority complex and fear. But thankfully there is none of that anymore.”
Attitudes towards people with disabilities are slowly improving in Pakistan, which has introduced laws against discrimination.
“We have seen over the years the mentality change tremendously. From many people hiding their deaf children, feeling embarrassed, ashamed,” noted Daniel Marc Lanthier, director of operations of the foundation behind Deaf Reach.
Nowadays families are “coming out in the open, asking for education for their children, asking to find employment for them,” he said, though much work remains.
“With a million deaf children who don’t have access to school, it’s a huge challenge, it’s a huge goal to be met.”
The schedule of applications for student visas has been announced by the German Embassy in Pakistan.
Student visa registration for the winter semester 2024-25 starts from May 21.
According to the embassy, appointments for students with an admission letter for the 2024 summer semester will not be offered by the end of MA, while any admission letter for the 2024 summer semester after May 15 will automatically be cancelled.
Affected students will be notified via email.
The move is being taken to streamline the visa process and address the high volume of applications received by the embassy.
Preference will be given to applicants and PhD students with scholarships from German institutions, while there is a special online registration category for students who have achieved a CGPA of 3.7 or above.
Applicants must prepare a comprehensive set of documents for their visa application, including various forms, copies of passports and IDs, educational records, proof of financial means and health insurance.
Matriculation exams are in progress across Sindh including Karachi, where serious lack of management has come to the fore once again.
According to Geo News, the English paper of class 9 in Karachi went viral on social media before it even started.
This is not the first case of its kind. A number of matriculation papers have been recently leaked. A physics paper was leaked just a few minutes after the examination started while the mathematics paper was out 30 minutes after the scheduled time.
Mexico City (AFP) – Dozens of pro-Palestinian students from Mexico’s largest university camped out Thursday in solidarity with similar protests that have swept colleges in the United States.
Mounting flags and chanting “Long live free Palestine,” the protesters set up tents in front of the National Autonomous University of Mexico’s (UNAM) head office in Mexico City.
The students called on the Mexican government to break diplomatic and commercial ties with Israel.
“We are here to support Palestine, the people who are in Palestine, and the student camps in the United States,” said Valentino Pino, a 19-year-old philosophy student.
Jimena Rosas, 21, said she hoped the protest would have a domino effect and spread to other universities in the country.
“Once people see that UNAM is beginning to mobilize, other universities should start as well,” she said.
Dozens of universities in the United States have seen pro-Palestinian demonstrations in recent weeks, leading to clashes with police and counter-protests.
Israeli genocide against Palestinians since October 8 has killed more than 34,500 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the territory’s health ministry.
Brown University on Tuesday reached an agreement with students protesting the genocide in Gaza that would see them remove their encampment from school grounds in exchange for the institution considering divesting from Israel.
The move represents a first major concession from an elite American university amid student protests that have taken over campuses across the country, divided public opinion and led to hundreds of arrests.
In a statement, Brown President Christina Paxson said students had agreed to end their protests and clear their camp by 5:00 pm local time Tuesday and “refrain from further actions that would violate Brown’s conduct code through the end of the academic year.”
In turn, “five students will be invited to meet with five members of the Corporation of Brown University in May to present their arguments to divest Brown’s endowment from ‘companies enabling and profiting from the genocide in Gaza’.”
The board will vote on the proposal in October.
Student protesters jumped for joy upon hearing the news of the deal and chanted “with love not fear, divestment is getting near” before beginning to remove their tents.
“We are ending (the encampment) knowing that we made a huge victory for divestment at Brown, for this international movement and a victory for the people of Palestine,” said Brown student Leo Corzo-Clark.
The university, located in Providence, Rhode Island, “has come to the table to listen to our demands and to listen to its students and to consider divesting from war, divesting from death, divesting from occupation,” said Sam Theoharis, another student protester.
In her statement, Paxson said “the devastation and loss of life in the Middle East has prompted many to call for meaningful change, while also raising real issues about how best to accomplish this.”
But she added: “I have been concerned about the escalation in inflammatory rhetoric that we have seen recently, and the increase in tensions at campuses across the country.”
Anti-Zionist students in the US have taken to their campuses to call out the blatant atrocities being committed by Israel in the besieged strip and the West Bank, and asking the universities to divest from investing in Israel.
The demonstrations have now expanded beyond US borders.
French police broke up a pro-Palestinian protest by dozens of university students in Paris, officials said Thursday, as Israel’s bombardment of Gaza sparks a wave of anger across college campuses in the United States.
AFP reports that according to witnesses, the protesters were demanding that Sciences Po university “cut its ties with universities and companies that are complicit in the genocide in Gaza” and “end the repression of pro-Palestinian voices on campus”.
Similarly, students in Sydney, Australia, have also set up a camp at Sydney University and carried out demonstrations.
Background:
The mass protests started from Columbia University on April 17 which then spread across colleges and universities in America.
The US has been openly supporting and financing Israeli genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza. And while many people have lost their jobs and students have been expelled due to their support for Gaza, the demonstrations on university campuses are getting bigger by the day.
Top universities such as Yale, NYU, and Columbia are facing heightened tensions as pro-Palestinian demonstrators are being arrested amid escalating conflicts between the two sides of the genocides.
Columbia granted students protesters an extension to disassemble their encampments twice, citing ongoing negotiations aimed at resolving the tense situation. All classes will be conducted virtually on Monday due to mounting tension.
On Monday, 60 individuals at Yale, including 47 student protesters, were arrested for trespassing after blocking traffic around the campus. Additionally, several protesters were also arrested at NYU.
Other American colleges and universities with Gaza encampments include Emerson College, MIT, Tufts, Michigan, Vanderbilt, Brown, Rice, and more.
It is a big moment in the midst of a genocide, a point in time where we all must decide to stand on the right side of history.
The Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) World University Rankings by subject released its list for 2024 and 14 universities from Pakistan have made it in the top 1,000.
It consists of more than 16,300 academic programmes, with an addition of over 600 in comparison to the previous year.
The 2024 list consists of 55 separate subjects under five broad areas. In total, 1,559 institutions are included, with 64 universities being added for the first time.
From Pakistan, the university programmes have qualified for Arts and Humanities, Engineering and Technology, Life Sciences and Medicine, Natural Sciences and Social Sciences and Management.
These have been ranked through various metrics, including academic reputation, employer reputation and the International Research Network (IRN) Index.
The Pakistani universities among the top 1,000 universities are COMSATS University Islamabad, National University of Sciences and Technology, University of the Punjab, Bahria University, International Islamic University, Lahore University of Management Sciences, University of Karachi, University of Peshawar, Aga Khan University, The Islamia University of Bahawalpur, Abdul Wali Khan University Mardan, University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences, Government College University Faisalabad and University of Malakand.
New York, United States – Tensions flared between pro-Palestinian student protesters and school administrators at several US universities Monday, as in-person classes were cancelled and demonstrators arrested.
The protests, which began last week at Columbia University with a large group of demonstrators establishing a “Gaza Solidarity Encampment” on school grounds, have spread to other campuses, including Yale, MIT and others.
Some Jewish students at Columbia have reported intimidation and anti-Semitism amid the days-long protest, which is calling for the prestigious New York institution to divest from companies with ties to Israel.
Classes were moved online Monday, with university president Nemat Shafik calling for a “reset” in an open letter to the school community.
“Over the past days, there have been too many examples of intimidating and harassing behavior on our campus,” she said.
“Anti-Semitic language, like any other language that is used to hurt and frighten people, is unacceptable and appropriate action will be taken.
“To deescalate the rancor and give us all a chance to consider next steps, I am announcing that all classes will be held virtually on Monday,” she added.
Last week, more than 100 protesters were arrested after university authorities called the police onto the private campus Thursday, a move that seemingly escalated tensions and sparked a greater turnout over the weekend.
Mimi Elias, a social work student who was arrested, told AFP on Monday: “We are going to stay until they talk to us and listen to our demands.”
“We don’t want anti-Semitism or Islamophobia. We are here for the liberation of all,” Elias said.
Joseph Howley, an associate professor of classics at Columbia, said the university had reached for the “wrong tool” by involving police, which had attracted “more radical elements that are not part of our student protests.”
“You can’t discipline and punish your way out of prejudice and community disagreement,” Howley told AFP.
As the holiday of Passover began Monday night, social media images appeared to show pro-Palestinian Jewish students holding traditional seder meals inside the protest areas on multiple campuses, including at Columbia.
Further downtown, police began detaining protesters who had set up their own encampment at New York University at around 8:30 pm, the New York Times reported, after the school called the students’ behavior “disorderly, disruptive, and antagonizing.”
There were also demonstrations at MIT, the University of Michigan and Yale, where at least 47 people had been arrested on Monday after refusing requests to disperse.
“The university made the decision to arrest those individuals who would not leave the plaza with the safety and security of the entire Yale community in mind,” the Ivy League university said in a statement.
At Harvard, university officials on Monday suspended the Palestinian Solidarity Committee, the student group said on Instagram.
They were ordered to “cease all organizational activities” for the rest of the term, or risk permanent expulsion after holding an unregistered demonstration last week, student newspaper the Harvard Crimson reported, citing an email to the group.
Universities have become the focus of intense cultural debate in the United States since Hamas’s October 7 attack and Israel’s overwhelming military response, as a humanitarian crisis grips the Palestinian territory of Gaza.
President Joe Biden on Monday said he condemned “the anti-Semitic protests.”
“I also condemn those who don’t understand what’s going on with the Palestinians,” he told reporters, without further details.
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