By Syed Tauqeer Zaidi
DERA ISMAIL KHAN: The Management Association in Dera Ismail Khan has called on the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government to permanently post school leaders as assistant sub-divisional education officer (ASDEO) circles, warning that failure to do so risks weakening oversight at the primary education level.
Speaking in Dera Ismail Khan, the association’s president, Dr Humayun Khattak, said the ASDEO circle posts had been formally approved by the provincial finance department with a clear purpose: to reduce the supervisory burden on education officers by cutting the number of schools under one officer from between 70 and 120 to just 10. This, he said, was essential for effective monitoring and improved school performance.
Khattak noted that the three-year contractual period of the school leaders had already ended and argued that they should be granted an extension and restored to their earlier ASDEO roles to protect their livelihoods. He said the policy decision taken during the tenure of former chief minister Ali Amin Gandapur should be upheld.
The demands were raised during a meeting with school leaders from Dera Ismail Khan, Tank and Lakki districts. Khattak said Khyber Pakhtunkhwa had the largest number of primary schools in the country, making meaningful checks and balances impossible without the active involvement of trained school leaders.
He added that the school leader positions were created with specific objectives and that sidelining them amounted to a waste of skilled human resources. Although the posts were approved under a defined strategy, he said, they were later de-tracked, undermining the original intent and resulting in the loss of three critical years.
Khattak urged the provincial government to revisit its policy and make full use of the experience and services of school leaders to strengthen the primary education system across Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
