ESSAY MATERIAL

1- EDUCATION:

Outline:

i. Importance/Purpose of education
ii. Quotations
iii. Evolution of Modern Education System
iv. Education in Middle Ages
v. Education and Islam
vi. School Education
vii. Education and Nation Building
viii. Comparative Analysis of Education System in the World
ix. Education System in Pakistan
x. Issues and Solutions
xi. Higher Education System in Pakistan and World
xii. Purpose of Higher Education
xiii. Problems and Solutions of Higher Education System
xiv. Research and Higher Education
xv. Economic Development and Higher Education
xvi. Recent reports, Economic Survey on education
xvii. Examples about success of Nations
xviii. Co-education
xix. Women Education

i. Importance/Purpose of Education:
In Life
 Education makes a person civilized and builds his character
(The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and critically.
Intelligence plus character-that is the end goal of true education, Martin Luther
King.)
 Education endows people with the ability to read and write
(“A person who does not read has no advantage over the one who can’t read” Mark
Twain)
 Technical skills can be attained through education
 Education is the only way to polish reasoning and intelligence
 Education gives knowledge which helps people shape their perspective
 In the present world, career depends upon education
(Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him
for lifetime” Maimonides)
 Education ensures personal freedom.
 (To educate a man is to unfit him to be a slave” Frederick Doughlas, A person can
only know his rights through education, “The only purpose of education is freedom;
the only method is experience” Leo Tolstoy, Education is the key to unlock golden
key of freedom” George Washington Carver)
 Values and Social Norms are transferred through Education
ii. Quotations:

i. The roots of education are bitter but the fruit is sweet. (Aristotle)
ii. Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the
world (Mandela).
iii. Education is not the learning of facts but the training of mind to think.
(Albert Einstein).
iv. “If your plan is for one year plant rice. If your plan is for ten
years plant trees. If your plan is for one hundred years educate children. 
(Confucius)

iii. Evolution of Modern Education System:

a) The academic form of curricular education was originated by the pagan Greek philosopher Plato,
427-347 b.c. He was the founder of education of regular curriculum in a fixed place. He called it
the academy.
b) At the beginning of the Christian era, pagan schools, on the Plato model, dotted the Roman
Empire. No Christian schools existed.
c) Printing had not yet been invented. Textbooks had to be prepared, laboriously, entirely by hand,
one at a time. All textbooks were pagan.
d) All leaders in the first five centuries of the Christian world were, of necessity, the pupils of this
pagan education.
e) Then the barbaric invasion swept away these schools. Through these years the only education in
the Western world was pagan. Pagan philosophies and religious beliefs and customs were
instilled automatically into growing children. Observance of pagan holidays was a regular part of
school life—as, surprising though it may seem, it continues to be today!
f) Education was instilled as a system of memory training. It was “spoon-fed,” literally funneled
into immature and growing minds. Children were taught to accept without question, assume
without proof, believe and memorize whatever was taught. This method, too, persists today.
Children are not taught to think—but to take orders—be followers, not leaders. Few know why
they believe the things they do. Through all those years, all literature in the Western world was
pagan.
g) Beginning the sixth century, the only schools were the monastic schools, for the training of
monks, and the cathedral schools, for the training of priests. These evolved into the universities of
Salerno, Bologna, Reggio, Padua, Modena, Vercelli and others.
h) The first university of our modern pattern was the University of Paris, beginning in the 12th
century.
i) English students, sent to the University of Paris, later (1167-68) founded Oxford University.
Oxford alumni founded Cambridge. Graduates of these universities founded Harvard in 1636,
William and Mary in 1693, Yale in 1701, and Princeton came later in 1746.
j) It was Thomas Jefferson who founded the first state university—the University of Virginia—in
1819. His motive was to divorce education from religion. This started the present materialistic
trend in American education. There was great public protest at the time. His new state university
was termed “shocking” and “irreligious.”
k) Two other factors added impetus to the materialistic drift. “Rationalism” spread its leaven
through every phase of the educational structure.
l) And, in the present century, Big Business has made sizeable financial contributions, conditioned
on establishment of technical, scientific and professional courses to train needed personnel for
these huge corporations. This has resulted in education becoming more and more a system of
training young people in the art of earning a living, at the expense of teaching them how to live!
They need to know both!
m) Prominent educators have voiced their alarm at this state of educational affairs. Many recognize
the evils and the dangers—yet confess their utter helplessness to break the drift or change the
direction.
n) In briefest summary: Education from earliest antiquity was a means of pagan religious instruction
which became a vehicle for disseminating pagan culture, religious doctrines and customs under
the Platonic curricular system. It evolved in our modern era into a system of instilling the
teachings of what the author-philosopher Dr. C. E. Ayers terms “Science, the False Messiah,” or
the “new religion” of rationalism and materialism, which, of course, masquerades under names
and terminology other than “religion.”

iv. Education and Islam:

1) By the middle of the 9th century, knowledge was divided into three categories: the
Islamic sciences, the philosophical and natural sciences (Greek knowledge), and the
literary arts.
 2) Early Muslim education emphasized practical studies, such as the application of
technological expertise to the development of irrigation systems,
architectural innovations, textiles, iron and steel products, earthenware, and leather
products; the manufacture of paper and gunpowder; the advancement of commerce; and
the maintenance of a merchant marine. 
3) Learning took place in a variety of institutions, among them the ḥalqah, or study circle;
the maktab (kuttab), or elementary school; the palace schools; bookshops and literary
salons; and the various types of colleges, the meshed, the masjid, and the madrasa.
4) The high degree of learning and scholarship in Islam, particularly during the ʿAbbāsid
period in eastern Islam and the later Umayyads in western Islam, encouraged the
development of bookshops, copyists, and book dealers in large, important Islamic cities
such as Damascus, Baghdad, and Córdoba.
5) Madrasas may have existed as early as the 9th century, but the most famous one was
founded in 1057 by the vizier Niẓām al-Mulk in Baghdad. The Niẓāmīyah, devoted to
Sunni learning, served as a model for the establishment of an extensive network of such
institutions throughout the eastern Islamic world
6) The contribution of these institutions to the advancement of knowledge was vast. Muslim
scholars calculated the angle of the ecliptic; measured the size of the Earth; calculated the
precession of the equinoxes; explained, in the field of optics and physics, such
phenomena as refraction of light, gravity, capillary attraction, and twilight; and developed
observatories for the empirical study of heavenly bodies. They made advances in the uses
of drugs, herbs, and foods for medication; established hospitals with a system of interns
and externs; discovered causes of certain diseases and developed correct diagnoses of
them; proposed new concepts of hygiene; made use of anesthetics in surgery with newly
innovated surgical tools; and introduced the science of dissection in anatomy.

v) Education in Middle Ages:

At the end of the Roman Empire Era, most of the educational institutes of Romans ceased to offer their
services. Gradually, Education was not the main concern anymore and fighting skills became more
important. Most of the rulers and politicians of this historical time gained power either through wars or
inheritance while education played a little or no role in their success.

The social and judicial society of medieval period was influenced by ancient Roman and Germanic
culture, however, the increasing influence of Church became the guiding force to develop educational
system in The Middle Ages.
The Church became more and more suspicious of Greek, Roman and Germanic culture and decided to
close down all pagan schools under the decree of Justinian by the year 529. Influence of Church gave rise
to monasticism. Monks, priests and bishops took the responsibility of teaching and the whole educational
pattern became purely religious.

Reach of education in The Middle Ages

Bishops and monks started to educate pupils of upper class while education for serfs and their kids was a
rare chance. This was because of the basic feudalistic structure which required the peasants and serfs to
work hard to earn a living and a right to protection under the fiefdom of their Lords. Peasants used to
engage their little kids in work as soon as possible. At that time, a child of 10-12 years was already
considered an adult.

In addition, it was advantageous for the ruler class and the clergy to keep the serfs away from education
institutes so that they may successfully rule over them. The fees for education which was required by the
Church, monasteries and cathedral schools were often too high for a common serf to pay for.

The whole education system was designed to keep serfs and peasants uneducated; indeed, education
during that time was very elitist. Study books were very rare and they were highly expensive and hence,
the only way to get education was to seek a teacher.

Boys of upper class used to learn how to read and write Latin which was the official language of the
medieval ages. Schools were run by monks. Bishops were also engaged in education system as they used
to run and manage cathedral schools. Some of the cathedrals attained great fame and became centers of
higher education and established themselves as universities.

Schooling System and Curriculum of education in The Middle Ages

The education system of Middle Ages was highly influenced by the Church. Basic course of study used to
contain Latin language, grammar, logic, rhetoric, philosophy, astrology, music and mathematics.
Scholars, monks and bishops used ancient writings from Roman and Greek resources to teach their
students while most of the educational courses were mostly based on superstitions and beliefs. Students
often learned more when they directly came in contact with trappers, hunters, poachers and serfs as they
could offer practical knowledge. 

While medieval students often belonged to upper class, they were used to sit together on the floor. They
used bones or ivory stylus. They used to scrawl notes on wax coated wooden blocks. By its influence, the
Church made it important for knights and members of nobility to learn and those knights who couldn’t
read or write were looked down upon. This was very important for them to know how to read because all
knights were supposed to understand and follow the code of chivalry as proposed by the clergy and
Church.

Education in The Middle Ages was a difficult task because of the tumultuous times. Frequent wars and
battles often disturbed monasteries and cathedral schools and halted studies. However, most of the times,
the monasteries and cathedral schools succeeded in reemerging themselves.
Children were taught in schools of monks and at the age of 14-15, they were announced as scholars.
Some of them could opt for higher studies in cathedral schools and universities under the management of
prestigious bishops. Any student who could prove that he knew arts well was announced as Master of
Arts. Students had the choice to learn theology, medicine or philosophy and after mastering any of these
subjects they were declared doctors.

Before attaining mastership, a student was required to attain baccalaureate which was considered as the
first step towards becoming a master of a subject. A student could attain baccalaureate by following the
course which was known as quadrivium. It included preliminary understanding of geometry, geography,
arithmetic, natural history, astronomy and music.

However, very few used to opt for education to get a degree. This was due to the fact that the basic means
of living were either fighting or working as a peasant. Members of nobility often preferred to learn
fighting skills over arts and mathematics while peasants and serfs had no use of higher education.

Those who studied in monasteries often became monks and they worked for preserving Roman and Greek
texts and they wrote new books. Mastership was necessary for a person to be able to teach at a university
in The Middle Ages.

Education in The Middle Ages for women

Under the feudal system of The Middle Ages, women had little or no chance of attaining education.
Education was rare for serfs and peasants and it was impossible for a girl or woman from a peasant
background to learn reading and writing.

However, girls of upper class were given benefits of education in a few cases. There were certain
obligations for women of nobility which required them to be literate. However, the course of education
for women was very limited and it was controlled by the Church.

The general feeling was that women were secondary and they needed to serve and remain under
protection of men. Whatever education a woman could attain was designed to help her in becoming a
good wife and mother in future.

Some scholars of medieval world advocated that women “be raised on sacred teachings.” In order to
become a nun, education was necessary for a girl; however, married life and children were the primary
goals of most of the girls during the medieval times.

School Education

After the American Revolution, education became a higher priority. States quickly began to establish

public schools. School systems were not uniform, however, and would often vary greatly from state to
state.

Credit for our modern version of the school system usually goes to Horace Mann. When he became
Secretary of Education in Massachusetts in 1837, he set forth his vision for a system of professional
teachers who would teach students an organized curriculum of basic content. For this reason, Mann is
often called the “Father of the Common School Movement."
Many other states quickly followed Mann's system he instituted in Massachusetts. More and more states
began to require school attendance. By 1918, every state required students to
complete elementary school. Educational improvements grew by leaps and bounds during the
20th century, leading to the advanced systems we enjoy today.

Education and Nation Building

i. The main hope of a nation lies in the proper education of its youth. (Erasmus)
ii. Education is an ornament in prosperity and a refuge in adversity. (Aristotle)
iii. The World will not be destroyed by those who do evils but by those who watch them and do
nothing. (Albert Einstein)
iv. The best way to predict the future is to create it. (Abraham Lincoln)

Education Systems around the world:

Feathers of Education System of Finland:

i. One year pre elementary, 9 years elementary education compulsory

ii. Finland’s education system boasts of giving hardly any homework to
its kids
iii. On average Finnish students only spend three hours and forty five
minutes in school.
iv. Finnish students start their elementary education much later, when
they are seven, unlike most other countries.
v. Teachers have utmost liberty in their curriculum. They don’t need to
follow particular teaching standards and teach what they feel is right. 
vi. Finnish students don’t have to pay fees for nine years of schooling and
as such there are no good schools and bad schools.
vii.  Every student gets a meal from school and this provides them with
the required energy to sustain throughout the day.
viii. Life-long learning is ensured by making it possible for leaners to take up
studies at any stage of their lives.

Global Statistics:

i. SDG-4 about Education

ii. GDP %: Norway spent highest on education (6.4%), India (3%), Pakistan (2.4% i.e. 77
billion)
iii. No. of Children out of School (2.4 million as per UN)
iv. Literacy rate : India (65% official statistics), Srilanka (96%)
v. Right to education is recognized as a fundamental right by UN Declaration of Human Rights
and UNESCO, UNDP, UNICEF are working to promote education.
 Education System of Pakistan

i. Three types of institutions, Madrass,Public, Private

ii. Urdu and English Medium system

Statistics from Economic Survey:

i. Literacy rate=62.3%,(49% in female and 70% in male). Rural-49% and Urban-70%

ii. Electricity=53%, Drinking Water-67%, Sanitation=67%
iii. According to UNDP Human Development Report 2018, Pakistan is at 150 th out of 189
countries in HD. India=130, Sri Lanka-76, Bangladesh-136
iv. Only Afghanistan lags behind in HD at 168
v. Universities-186 none in top 500
vi. Total GDP% expenditure in 2017-18, 2.4%

Books:

i. Education, Inequalities and Freedom by Shahid Siddiqui

ii. Era of Darkness by Shashi Tharor
iii. Education & Social Order by Bertrand Russell
iv. Unpopular Essays by Bertrand Russell
v. Pakistan: Beyond Crisis by Maliha Lodhi
vi. Pakistan: Courting the Abyss by Tilak Devasher
vii. Making of Pakistan by K.K Aziz
 Democracy:

Books:
General
i. Political Order and Political Decay by Francis Fukuyama
ii. Third Wave of Democratization by Samuel Huntington
iii. Enlightenment Now By Stephen Pinker
iv. Republic by Plato
v. Democratic Authority by David Estlund
vi. Lessons of History by Will Durant
vii. Era of Darkness by Shashi Thror
viii. Why Democracies Die

Pakistan:

i. Pakistan: A Hard Country by Anatol Lieven

ii. Pakistan at Cross road by Christophe Jeffrelot
iii. The Pakistan Paradox by Christophe Jeffrelot
iv. Pakistan: Beyond the Crisis by Maleeha Lodhi
v. Pakistan: Courting the Abyss by Tilak Divasher
vi. Military & Politics in Pakistan by Dr. Hassan Askari
vii. Democracy & Governance by Tahir Kamran

Articles:

i. Democracy as a Universal Value by Amartya Sen

ii. Democracy and its global roots by Amartya Sen
iii. End of History by Francis Fukuyama
iv. Three Waves of Democracy
v. Democracy in East Asia
vi. Democracy in South Asia
vii. Democracy in Europe
viii. Democracy in Middle East
ix. Islam and Democracy
x. Dr. Hassan Askar
xi. S. Akbar Zaidi

Report:

i. Democracy Index by The Economist

ii. UN reports on Democracy

Quotes