Events
Pakistan: Workshops on Women in Higher Education Management - November 2002
Between 13th and 21st November 2002, Colleen Chesterman was in Pakistan working with the Fatimah Jinnah Women University (FJWU), Rawalpindi, Pakistan which organised a workshop for senior women in collaboration with the British Council, Pakistan and the Association of Commonwealth Universities (ACU) represented by Mrs Dorothy Garland, Deputy Director. Participants included 22 senior women academics and administrators from different regions of Pakistan, from both private and public universities, as well as representatives from Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. The ACU and the Commonwealth Secretariat has organised similar workshops in developing Commonwealth countries since 1985, eg in India, Malaysia, Gambia, Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Barbados and Kenya. The workshops aim to sensitise women to the issues they face in advancing their careers; plan strategies for improving their own competencies; attempt changes in the university environments in which they work and enable them to train other women.
This workshop was designed as a training of trainers using materials on women and higher education management which have been prepared and tested in previous workshops and are published by the Commonwealth Secretariat and the ACU. There are now 8 modules, each involving plans for a number of workshops. Colleen Chesterman prepared workshops on Women and Mentoring in Higher Education and introduced these in Pakistan. Others taking part in the Pakistan training included Dr Jasbir Singh, consultant to the ACU, Professor Najma Najam, VC of FJWU, Dr Iftekhar Hasan of the FJWU Women's Research and Resources Centre and Anne Gold from London University Institute of Education. The importance of having such a strong women-focussed institution as FJWU was underlined by brief reports on the status/participation of women in their institutions presented by a number of participants. All the reports highlighted the scarcity of women in senior management levels eg . Punjab University, Lahore pointed to the fact that there was no woman in any senior position until the level of Deputy Chief Librarian and of 31 Heads of Department only 5 were female. At the Agriculture University, Faisalabad of the total 5000 students on campus 940 were women but there were only 2 women among 54 professors. In the National University of Science and Technology (NUST) there were only 39 women faculty permanent staff from a total of 456.
The reasons offered for the poor representation revolved around:
- Low levels of education of women (not the case in Bangladesh and Sri Lanka)
- Home and family issues such as housekeeping, child care, caring of aged parents, social responsibilities.
- Cultural constraints imposed by parents and societal and religious demands. and constraints and expectations. Issues of confidence, jealousy.
- Structural issues eg all male selection boards. There was concern about some senior women being biased against their own gender.
At the opening ceremony after a supportive speech from the federal minister for Education and Science and Technology, Professor Najma Najam called on the Minister and the Higher Education Commission to make it binding for universities to have a proportional representation of women in administration as well as the senior positions in the University and announced the establishment of the Center of Executive Development in Higher Education at Fatimah Jinnah University, to facilitate the training of master trainers in higher education management.
Participants had selected 4 of the ACU training modules, management skills for women, women and mentoring in higher education, women's studies as a catalyst to the enhancement of women's status; and managing personal and professional roles. Daily sessions were devoted to critiquing the training modules with a view to adopting, adapting or rejecting the materials for use within the local context.
On the last day participants formulated action plans which would take forward the work of the women's programme in their own institutions and countries. These primarily aimed at increasing the number of women in management positions through greater gender sensitisation, enhancing the capacity of women academics, improving their networking and information/experience sharing, and helping to change the culture of universities to make women more competitive for senior management positions. The delegates left with an enthusiastic commitment to changing the situation of women in their institutions.
Photographs:
Participants in the workshop and sponsors at the opening ceremony.
Front row from left: Dr. Jasbir Singh, Professor Iftekhar Hasan, Professor Najma
Najam, the Pakistani Minister for Education Science and Training, Ms Dorothy Garland
and a representative from the British Council.
Colleen Chesterman watches as participants explore the possibilities of mentoring
in their own institutions
Outside the entrance to the Chancellery of the beautiful Fatima Jinnah Women's University
Formulating action plans