Federal Directorate of Education (FDE) to set up FG College for Home Economics

Islamabad, Federal Directorate of Education (FDE) has initiated a project of the first ever Federal Government College for Home Economics & Management Sciences in the federal capital to facilitate female students.

The project has been approved by the Ministry of Education at a cost of Rs450 million, said Rafique Tahir, Spokesman FDE.

Ministry of Education has recruited a project director for the College, which will be constructed in Sector F-11 and CDA has handed over the plot to FDE.

The groundbreaking ceremony of the College would be held in the next few months, he said. This would be a unique college in the sector where earlier, there was no such facility for the female students.

There are at present 19 model colleges and seven federal government colleges in Islamabad city. FDE has already accomplished the project of a federal government college for women in Sector I-8/3.

A far more significant step was the start of the classes of Masters in Commerce (MCom) at Federal Government College of Commerce, H-8. For this purpose, a commerce block with a capacity of 60 boys and 40 girls was completed at the cost of Rs30 million where the classes were started in November. The most heartening aspect is that students would get quality education by spending just Rs37,000, while the private commerce colleges charge Rs200,000-300,000 for this degree, Rafique said.

In the area between Lahore and Peshawar, the College is the first one to offer postgraduate degree in this discipline, he said.

The students face shortage of model colleges during the admission days and FDE is working on the proposal to construct more model colleges to give more opportunities to students. The proposal to construct model colleges in Sector G-13 and Sihala are under-consideration to cater to the educational needs of the students.

During the year 2009, 1,400 teachers from primary to higher secondary level were given training in various disciplines and the Directorate set the target to give training to 1,000 teachers in the coming days. Moreover, eight teachers selected from different colleges got six-week training in USA under the joint venture of FDE and USAID project Ed-Links. For the students, Excel camps were arranged this year in the subjects of Science, Maths and English, he said.

Transportation for female teachers, who travel a long distance to teach, remains a major issue for FDE. This year, the department approved the project of six buses to facilitate the teachers and students of rural areas. It got the funds for the first phase of the project.