PR No. 179 ICT SKILLS TRAINING SHOULD BEGIN FROM EARLY CHILDHOOD, ANUSHA REHMAN Islamabad: June 24, 2016

Inauguration & MOU Signing between Capital Administrative Division and Cisco Pakistan was performed at Ministry of Information Technology & Telecommunication. The said MoU was signed by Mr. Hasan Iqbal, Federal Secretary CAD and Mr. Naveed Qazi, Country Manager Cisco Pakistan in the presence of Mrs. Anusha Rehman, Minister of State for IT & Telecom and the State Minister for CAD Dr. Tariq Fazal Chaudhry. The objective of the MoU is to provide technical training on Cisco’s IT essentials to Public School teachers of Grade-VI and beyond in Islamabad to promote ICT & Digital Content Development for children in Public Sector Schools. This program will also be expanded to primary school children in the next phase. Secretary IT Mr. Rizwan Bashir Khan, Additional Secretary (IT), Additional Secretary (CAD), Member (IT), Member (Telecom), Member (HRD) and other officials from MoIT and CAD were also present at the signing ceremony.

This initiative is an outcome of Prime Minister of Pakistan’s vision to promote ICT & Digital Content Developments and leading towards Digital Pakistan.

During the said event, the Minister of State for IT stated that the Honorable Prime Minister of Pakistan is steering the vision of Digital Pakistan. The Minister of State for IT further explained that for true materialization of the vision of “Accelerated Digitization” it is imperative that all those ICT opportunities which are available to the students of private sector schools should also be made equally available to the students of public sector school. MoS-IT also said that in this technologically advanced era it is need of the time that we should provide all opportunities to our children to start learning modern ICT skills like Coding etc from early Childhood education. It will be a complete “Paradigm Shift” that will lead to holistic roadmap for our young generation to use ICTs which in turn will eventually enhance the volume of entrepreneurship and employability potential.

The Minister of State for Capital Administration and Development Division (CAD), Dr. Tariq Fazal Chaudhry expressed his gratitude to Minister of State for IT for her active support in this endeavor. He further stated that in accordance with the vision of Prime Minister of Pakistan we are in the process of provisioning of IT infrastructure in the Federal Public Schools so that technology becomes an integral part of these schools and to create ICT enabled environment. He further added that MoIT’s initiative regarding ICT & Digital Content Development will definitely be a paradigm shift in the way that educators think about computers and its usage in the public sector schools and hoped that the same model will be followed by the Provincial Governments to promote ICT Education in public schools in future too.

Country Head Cisco Mr. Naveed Qazi said that the mission of Cisco aligns with the vision of Government of Pakistan. He assured the Government of their fullest commitment & support to bring the power of Cisco Network Academy Program to Pakistan, with a particular focus on women & children.

PREVIOUS NEXT