The Sindh College Education Department has announced sweeping reforms for provincial colleges, placing student counselling services and a ban on unnecessary mobile phone use on campuses at the center of its policy overhaul, ARY News reported on Wednesday. The department will launch a new counselling program by hiring education experts, bureaucrats, and professionals to guide students, while a formal notification banning excessive mobile phone use is expected soon.
The decisions were taken during a meeting chaired by the Secretary of College Education, Nadeem Memon, where officials reviewed teacher absenteeism, weak monitoring mechanisms, and substandard construction work in several colleges.
The meeting was informed that 44 male and 36 female teachers have remained absent for long periods. The department decided to take immediate legal action, forwarding the cases to the Chief Secretary of Sindh and directing that public notices be published in newspapers.
To improve governance, the department approved the formation of an autonomous Monitoring and Evaluation Directorate by merging existing inspection wings. The new body will strictly monitor attendance, infrastructure quality, and academic standards.
Secretary Memon also ordered drafting a plan to establish a College Infrastructure Development Unit, under which all future development projects will be executed through professional consulting firms selected through national and international tenders.
Alongside counselling services and the mobile phone ban, the department will implement the “Each One, Teach One” initiative to bring out-of-school children back into the education system.
Secretary Nadeem Memon stressed that the department would allow no compromise on implementation, warning that officers failing to perform their duties would face strict disciplinary action without discrimination.