Rs3.4b NIETE project to build human capital

According to The Express Tribune, Planning Minister Ahsan Iqbal toured the National Institute of Excellence in Teacher Education (NIETE) on Friday, where he was briefed on its programmes. Iqbal said quality education and skilled teachers are central to national progress, and that the curriculum only works when teachers keep their methods current. He also recalled that four major projects covering curriculum, examinations and teacher training were assigned to the education ministry between 2013 and 2018.

The revised NIETE project, costed at Rs3.4 billion, widens the initiative under the education emergency that the prime minister announced. It extends an original scheme the federal education ministry began in 2023, aimed at raising teacher quality under Iqbal's direction. It also fits within URAAN Pakistan's Five Es National Economic Transformation Plan and Sustainable Development Goal 4, and it grew out of a National Consultative Meeting held in July 2022.

Iqbal urged a move away from rote learning toward creativity and critical thinking, and said artificial intelligence should support teachers rather than replace them. He called for the training institute to reach international benchmarks, with the aim of becoming the best such body in South Asia. He stressed that the institute's real base is the classroom and school, and that research should move from classrooms to evidence, then to policy and back to better teaching.